°70-3 


\  <3.r>i, 

\  Christianity  and  World  Problems:  No.  2 


RUSSIA 

A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 

BY 


SHERWOOD  EDDY 

AUTHOR  OF  “FACING  THE  CRISIS,”  ‘'EVERYBODY’S  WORLD, 
“THE  NEW  WORLD  OF  LABOR,’  ETC. 


NEW  'HEJT  YORK 
GEORGE  H.  DORAN  COMPANY 


Ten  Cents  Net 


COPYRIGHT,  1923, 

BY  GEORGE  H,  DORAN  COMPANY 


RUSSIA!  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 
- C  - 

PRINTED  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMERICA 


CONTENTS 


Introduction  ..... 

Russia  a  Warning 
Russia  a  Challenge  .  .  . 

Russia’s  Past  ..... 

The  Revolution  .... 
Military  Communism 
The  New  Economic  Policy 
The  Present  Government  . 
Russian  Industry 
Education  and  Religion  in  Russia 
The  Final  Challenge  .... 


PUBLISHER’S  NOTE 

This  pamphlet  seeks  impartially  to  state  the  facts  ob¬ 
served  in  a  recent  trip  to  Russia,  allowing  the  reader  to 
form  his  own  conclusions.  Where  views  are  expressed 
they  are  purely  personal  and  do  not  represent  those  of  any 
organization.  The  pamphlet  contains,  with  additional 
material,  brief  selections  from  Chapters  IV  and  IX  of  the 
author’s  book  “The  New  World  of  Labor/'  published 
by  George  H.  Doran  Company,  240  pages,  $1.50.  Table 
of  Contents:  Chapters  I,  Industrial  China;  II,  The  New 
Japan;  III,  India’s  Industrial  Revolution;  IV,  The  Re¬ 
construction  of  Russia;  V,  The  Evolution  of  Labor  in  the 
West;  VI,  The  British  Labor  Movement;  VII,  Labor  in 
Europe;  VIII,  American  Labor  Problems;  IX,  The  Chal¬ 
lenge  of  a  New  World  of  Labor. 


iv 


INTRODUCTION 


At  the  entrance  of  Petrograd,  the  former  capital  of  Russia, 
there  stands  in  the  public  square  the  vulgar,  squat  and  bulg¬ 
ing  statue  of  the  royal  autocrat,  Alexander  III.  No  statue  in 
the  world  so  embodies  the  insolence  of  autocracy.  Instead  of 
destroying  this  statue  the  Bolshevist  leaders  of  the  Russian 
Workers  Revolution  of  November  7,  1917,  with  a  fine  sense 
of  humor  have  carefully  preserved  it  and  have  placed  under 
it  the  following  significant  inscription :  “My  father  and  son 
during  their  lifetime  paid  the  price  of  their  tyranny  (both 
were  assassinated),  while  I  stand  here  as  a  miserable  scare¬ 
crow  to  zvarn  all  nations  of  the  sin  of  autocracy.”  All  Rus¬ 
sia,  as  well  as  this  statue,  stands  before  the  world  today  both 
as  a  warning  and  a  challenge.  She  is  a  warning  not  to  drift 
blindly,  as  her  former  government  did,  to  its  impending 
doom ;  she  is  a  challenge  to  every  nation  to  put  its  house  in 
order  before  it  is  too  late. 

With  the  thought  in  mind  of  studying  the  significance  of 
the  present  movement  we  visited  Russia.  Concerning  no 
other  country  has  there  been  such  a  flood  of  propaganda,  both 
red  and  white,  such  exaggeration  and  distortion  of  fact  in  the 
interest  of  passion  and  prejudice.  In  no  other  country  did 
we  find  it  so  difficult  simply  to  see  and  to  tell  the  truth  objec¬ 
tively.  For  instance,  as  we  crossed  the  border  we  saw  the 
red  flag  and  the  soldiers  of  the  red  army.  To  one  traveler 
in  our  compartment  they  suggested  the  red  of  bloodshed  and 
the  terror,  to  another  the  great  principle  of  the  blood  of  a 
common  humanity  of  one  brotherhood.  The  determining 
factor  was  the  attitude  of  the  observer.  It  is  so  throughout 
Russia.  Some  can  see  nothing  good,  and  others  nothing  bad, 
because  of  their  prejudice. 

Our  one  desire  has  been  to  keep  an  open  mind  and  to  be 
fair;  to  record  impartially  and  objectively  what  we  saw. 
During  our  visit,  from  Riga  through  Russia  and  back  to  the 
Polish  border,  we  moved  everywhere  with  perfect  freedom. 
We  went  anywhere  alone  by  night  or  day,  chose  our  own 
interpreters,  selected  the  factories  we  wished  to  inspect,  saw 
everything  we  desired  and  talked  with  everybody  we  wished, 
whether  they  were  friends  or  foes  of  the  present  regime. 
Nowhere  have  we  been  accorded  greater  kindness,  courtesy 
and  freedom  of  movement ;  or  met  more  frank,  fearless  and 
honest  men  than  some  of  the  leaders  we  interviewed.  We 

5 


6  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 


criticized  freely  the  methods  of  the  government  and  told  the 
leaders  the  evils  we  observed  in  their  system. 

With  all  its  faults  the  present  government  impressed  us 
as  better  than  the  hideous  regime  of  old  Czarist  Russia 
which  we  found  a  decade  ago.  Instead  of  the  hunger  and 
famine  in  Moscow,  “the  city  of  the  dead,”  of  two  years 
before,  it  is  now  stirring  with  new  life  and  its  population  has 
increased  from  one  to  two  millions.  Shops  are  open,  private 
business  is  thriving,  buying  and  selling  in  industry  and  agri¬ 
culture  are  in  full  swing;  everywhere  streets  are  being  paved, 
houses  repaired  and  painted  and  life  is  quickened  by  a  new 
hope. 

We  attended  the  great  All-Russian  Agricultural  and  Home 
Industries  Exhibition  where  the  whole  life  of  Russia  is 
focused  and  visualized  from  the  Arctic  to  the  semi-tropics, 
from  the  Esquimaux  of  the  Pacific  to  Turkestan  and  the 
borders  of  India.  We  saw  their  exhibits  of  industry,  agri¬ 
culture,  peasant  life  and  the  working  of  their  great  Co-op¬ 
eratives.  We  observed  their  demonstrations  and  tourist 
parties  for  nearly  a  million  peasants  brought  in  from  all  the 
Russias  to  be  instructed  in  the  use  of  tractors  and  modern 
machinery,  for  demonstrations  in  methods  of  farming,  the 
conduct  of  community  centers,  social  welfare  and  training 
for  citizenship. 

With  all  its  mistakes,  which  are  many,  we  found  an  actual 
government  composed  for  the  most  part  of  workingmen, 
administering  with  growing  success  the  most  extensive  state 
in  the  world.  And  they  are  in  a  measure  economically  suc¬ 
ceeding  after  facing  for  six  years  probably  the  most  colossal 
combination  of  difficulties  which  ever  confronted  a  single 
people  in  the  same  period  of  time.  They  have  had  to  over¬ 
come  the  inheritance  of  a  corrupt  Czarist  regime,  the  greatest 
loss  of  any  nation  in  the  World  War,  a  world  blockade  and 
two  revolutions.  They  have  had  to  meet  allied  invasion  from 
without  and  counter  revolutionary  white  armies  within, 
fighting  at  one  time  on  twelve  fronts.  They  have  had  to 
contend  with  the  strike  and  sabotage  of  almost  their  whole 
bureaucracy  and  united  bourgeois  opposition.  Finally,  they 
have  had  to  pass  in  turn  through  chaos,  bankruptcy  and 
awful  famine. 

Despite  the  almost  daily  prophecy  of  their  speedy  down¬ 
fall,  and  their  widespread  unpopularity,  they  have  emerged 
from  all  this  not  only  more  firmly  entrenched  than  ever,  but 
apparently  the  most  enduring  cabinet  or  party  in  Europe 


INTRODUCTION 


7 


today.  The  Conservative  Baldwin  Government  in  Britain, 
and  that  of  Poincare  in  France,  Stresemann  in  Germany  and 
Mussolini  in  Italy  give  promise  of  falling  long  before  that  in 
Russia.  We  refer  in  this  connection  to  the  government  as 
enduring,  in  the  British  sense  of  the  cabinet  or  party  in 
power,  not  to  the  social  order.  Nearly  all  responsible  leaders 
in  Russia  agree  that  the  people  are  utterly  sick  of  further 
war,  or  revolution,  or  foreign  intervention  which  proved  such 
a  miserable  failure  and  that  there  is  no  other  party  in  sight 
that  could  preserve  law  and  order  in  Russia. 

Now  let  us  face  the  facts.  Here  is  a  movement  of  vast 
possible  significance  for  good  or  evil,  which  must  be  studied 
and  interpreted  if  we  are  to  understand  the  present  interna¬ 
tional  situation. 

As  we  endeavored  to  focus  our  thought  and  sum  up  our 
conflicting  impressions  of  Russia,  which  is  today  such  a 
strange  mixture  of  good  and  evil,  we  found  that  they  could 
not  be  reduced  to  a  single  formula.  Rather  we  were  forced 
to  note  the  things  wherein  Russia  constitutes  a  warning  to 
the  world,  and  those  in  which  she  is  a  challenge  to  other 
nations.  Here  was  a  nation  which  had  suffered  centuries  of 
oppression,  at  the  hands  both  of  the  State  and  of  the  Church ; 
under  autocracy,  aristocracy  and  plutocracy,  under  a  system 
which  was  the  antithesis  of  liberty,  equality  and  fraternity. 
The  leaders  who  rose  to  throw  off  the  tyranny  of  this  system 
sought  earnestly  to  establish  a  new  social  order  of  righteous¬ 
ness.  But  in  destroying  the  evil  of  the  old  order  they  swept 
away  also  much  that  was  good.  They  sought  to  set  up  on  a 
vast  scale  a  government  of  the  working  masses,  by  the  work¬ 
ers,  for  the  workers.  But  in  their  determination  to  abolish 
the  tyranny  of  the  rule  of  the  bourgeois  class  they  finally  felt 
themselves  driven  to  a  party  dictatorship  which  denied  liberty 
to  the  rest  of  the  people.  In  seeking  to  abolish  the  super¬ 
stition  and  abuses  of  a  reactionary  and  political  state  church, 
they  almost  rooted  up  the  wheat  with  the  tares,  and  wellnigh 
threatened  to  destroy  religion  itself.  Thus  in  its  temporary 
dictatorship  and  tyranny  Russia  constitutes  a  warning  to 
other  nations.  But  in  so  far  as  they  seek  to  build  anew  a 
state  which  shall  provide  liberty  and  justice  for  all  exploited 
peoples,  Russia  constitutes  a  challenge  to  the  world.  These 
we  may  state  briefly  at  the  outset  as  follows : 


RUSSIA  A  WARNING 


1.  Russia  stands  as  a  warning  and  menace  in  its  orthodox 
Marxian  policy  of  the  class  war  and  the  dictatorship  of  the 
proletariat.  They  believe  that  other  countries  have  a  veiled 
dictatorship  of  the  privileged  one-tenth,  while  they  claim  a 
frank  dictatorship  on  behalf  of  the  hitherto  unprivileged  nine- 
tenths  who  constitute  the  working  masses.  •  They  claim  that 
this  dictatorship  is  temporary,  and  that  once  it  has  been  fully 
established  by  a  minority  on  behalf  of  the  majority,  it  will 
automatically  terminate  all  class  distinctions,  abolish  itself 
and  take  in  the  whole  united  communal  society.  But  the  love 
of  power  may  prove  an  evil  and  a  tyranny  as  great  as  the 
love  of  money  which  they  decry.  Class  war  means  class 
hatred,  and  it  means  a  civil  war  of  force  and  violence. 

2.  There  is  a  fundamental  denial  of  liberty  to  all  who 
oppose  the  government,  similar  to  that  of  the  old  regime. 
Russia  has  always  had  a  strong,  stern,  centralized,  autocratic 
government.  As  we  compare  Russia  under  the  Bolsheviks, 
and  under  the  Czar  as  we  saw  it  a  decade  ago,  the  present 
government  appears  to  be  better  than  that  of  the  old  system. 
But  there  is  little  room  for  the  expression  of  public  opinion, 
no  freedom  of  the  press,  and  no  liberty  for  voting  or  acting 
on  economic,  social  or  religious  issues  in  opposition  to  the 
policy  of  the  present  government.  For  the  present  at  least 
they  frankly  profess  dictatorship  rather  than  democracy. 
The  priceless  possession  of  the  spirit  of  liberty,  after  a  thou¬ 
sand  years  of  struggle,  has  been  abandoned,  at  least  for  the 
present. 

3.  There  is  a  continued  bureaucracy,  compulsion  and  state 
control  of  life ,  often  similar  to  that  of  the  old  regime,  that 
does  not  allow  the  same  free  play  for  independence  and  indi¬ 
vidual  initiative  that  is  found  in  other  countries.  There  is  a 
remarkable  discipline  in  the  Communist  Party  which  is  today 
guiding  the  destinies  of  the  132,000,000  people  of  Russia. 
Of  the  body  politic,  the  directing  brain  and  nervous  system 
is  the  Communist  Party  of  450,000 ;  the  body  and  hands  are 
the  workers  in  organized  trade  unions  numbering  some 
5,000,000;  the  ponderous  limbs  are  the  more  than  110,000,000 
peasants  who  constitute  85  per  cent  of  the  population.  Most 
of  the  rest  are  considered  vestigial  survivals  like  the  appendix 
which  once  had  a  functional  use.  This  dominance  of  the 

8 


RUSSIA  A  WARNING 


9 


Communist  Party  constitutes  an  abnormal  control  which  is  a 
denial  of  democracy. 

4.  There  is  an  evident  lowering  of  standards  in  higher 
education,  especially  in  the  universities.  Russia  has  a  re¬ 
markable  plan  for  primary,  practical  and  technical  education, 
though  she  lacks  means  as  yet  adequately  to  carry  it  out. 
But  there  has  been  a  frank  suppression  of  idealistic  teaching 
in  philosophy,  theology  and  cultural  studies ;  a  suppression  of 
academic  freedom,  and  a  dilution  of  the  universities  in  the 
interest  of  practical,  utilitarian  education  for  the  working 
classes.  There  is  a  whole  Russian  university  in  Berlin  com¬ 
posed  largely  of  professors  and  students  who  were  banished 
for  their  idealism  or  who  fled  from  the  terror  or  from  the 
red  armies. 

5.  There  is  still  a  painful  lack  of  moral  and  spiritual  stand¬ 
ards  in  Russian  life,  chiefly  as  the  result  of  the  inherited 
corruption  of  the  Czarist  regime,  the  pressure  of  poverty, 
and  a  materialistic  and  atheistic  interpretation  of  life.  Typ¬ 
ical  of  this  lack  of  moral  standards  we  may  take  the  statement 
of  Joffe  in  an  article  entitled  “Revolutionary  Methods,”  in 
the  official  Moscow  IZVESTIA,  dated  January  1,  1919: 
“To  deceive  your  class  enemy,  to  violate,  to  destroy  a  treaty 
imposed  by  force,  but  never  to  sin  against  the  revolutionary 
proletariat,  never  to  violate  the  obligation  taken  on  yourself 
before  the  revolution — those  are  the  true  revolutionary  meth¬ 
ods  of  the  true  revolutionary  struggle.” 

As  a  result  of  this  situation,  liberty,  religion  and  idealism 
will  have  to  fight  for  their  very  life  in  Russia  during  this 
generation  as  in  no  other  country  in  the  world. 

6.  Despite  the  measure  of  liberty  of  conscience  and  relig¬ 
ious  toleration  which  the  government  has  allowed  to  the 
Church  and  to  all  who  have  real  religious  convictions,  there 
is  a  frankly  avowed  atheism,  materialism  and  anti-religious 
policy  of  the  individual  members  of  the  Communist  Party. 
At  the  plenary  meeting  of  the  Third  International  a  resolu¬ 
tion  adopted  on  July  1,  1923,  speaks  of  “The  Marxian  view¬ 
point,  an  essential  part  of  which  is  atheism.”  This  is  not 
to  be  wondered  at  when  we  remember  the  religious  conditions 
which  prevailed  in  Czarist  Russia. 

We  appreciate  the  deep,  mystical  religious  consciousness 
of  the  Russian  people,  their  unique  capacity  for  suffering  and 
sacrifice,  and  the  sublime  elements  of  worth  in  the  Orthodox 
Church  once  it  is  reformed.  But  when  it  is  remembered  how 


10  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 


some  of  Russia’s  present  leaders  suffered  at  the  hands  of 
the  Church  as  well  as  of  the  State,  and  what  a  caricature  of 
religion  was  often  presented  to  them  in  the  superstition,  hy¬ 
pocrisy  and  corruption  in  the  Church,  typified  at  its  worst  by 
such  men  as  Rasputin,  their  rejection  of  the  only  religion 
they  knew  is  not  so  much  to  be  wondered  at  as  their  measure 
of  toleration.  They  have,  however,  been  merciless  to  those 
whom  they  believed  were  guilty  of  counter-revolutionary 
plotting  and  meddling  in  politics. 

Thus  as  a  warning  Russia  furnishes  the  first  avowedly 
atheistic  government  in  history  which  has  given  promise  of 
permanence.  While  granting  liberty  of  conscience  and  wor¬ 
ship,  the  Communists  are  frankly  aiming  as  far  as  possible 
to  root  out  of  the  rising  generation  all  religion,  which  they 
regard  as  sheer  superstition.  Religion  is  on  trial  in  Russia, 
Religious  formalism,  oppression,  tyranny,  priest-craft,  polit¬ 
ical  espionage,  meddling  in  politics,  hypocrisy,  bogus  relics 
and  sham  have  been  mercilessly  condemned.  Along  with 
deep  devotion  and  mysticism  these  evils  all  existed  in  the  old 
Russia  and  they  must  perish.  Nothing  but  truth  and  reality, 
nothing  but  the  most  vital  moral  and  spiritual  dynamic,  as 
ready  to  suffer  for  its  faith  as  were  the  Bolshevist  revolu¬ 
tionists  in  the  dungeons  of  the  Czar  and  the  wastes  of 
Siberian  exile,  can  meet  the  ordeal  which  religion  must  face 
in  Russia  today. 

The  fundamental  instincts  of  human  nature,  hunger  and 
love,  both  in  the  material  and  spiritual  realm,  cannot  be 
crushed  and  conquered  either  by  capitalism  or  Communism. 
Both  systems  in  their  worst  applications  have  outraged  the 
free  spirit  of  man.  But  man  survived  the  enthroning  of  a 
painted  Goddess  of  Reason  in  the  enduring  cathedral  of 
Notre  Dame,  the  red  terror  of  the  guillotine,  and  the  mili¬ 
tarism  and  sordid  vanity  of  the  Corsican  butcher  who  made 
a  caricature  of  the  French  Revolution.  France  still  bears  the 
scars  of  the  evils  of  that  period.  Yet  the  great  ideals  of 
liberty,  equality  and  fraternity  lived  on  in  a  freer  Europe 
despite  the  wild  license  and  debasing  mixture  of  good  and 
evil  in  the  movement. 

In  the  light  of  the  experience  of  Russia  which  constitutes 
a  warning  to  other  nations,  we  do  not  believe  that  State 
Capitalism,  State  Socialism  or  Military  Communism  furnish 
any  panacea  for  the  evils  of  our  present  system.  We  do  not 


RUSSIA  A  WARNING 


11 


believe  in  the  Bolshevist  theory  of  life  for  the  reasons  already 
stated — its  class  war  and  dictatorship,  its  fundamental  denial 
of  liberty,  its  state  control  of  life,  its  lowering  of  standards 
in  higher  education,  its  lack  of  moral  and  spiritual  standards 
and  its  anti-religious  policy. 

In  spite  of  all  its  own  defects,  however,  we  must  also 
observe  wherein  this  nation  constitutes  a  challenge.1 

1  Woodrow  Wilson  broke  the  silence  of  his  retirement  to  warn  the  nation  in 
the  August  Atlantic  on  “The  Road  Away  From  Revolution.”  He  says,  “There 
must  be  some  real  ground  for  the  universal  unrest  and  perturbation.  *  *  *  It 
probably  lies  deep  in  the  sources  of  the  spiritual  life  of  our  time.  It  leads  to 
revolution;  and  perhaps  if  we  take  the  case  of  the  Russian  Revolution,  the  out¬ 
standing  event  of  its  kind  in  our  age,  we  may  find  a  good  deal  of  instruction  for 
our  judgment  of  present  critical  situations  and  circumstances. 

‘‘What  gave  rise  to  the  Russian  Revolution?  The  answer  can  only  be  that  it 
was  the  product  of  a  whole  social  system.  *  *  *  It  was  due  to  the  systematic 
denial  to  the  great  body  of  Russians  of  the  rights  and  privileges  which  all  normal 
men  desire.  *  *  *  It  is  against  capitalism  under  one  name  or  another  that  the 
discontented  classes  everywhere  draw  their  indictment.  *  *  *  Great  and  wide¬ 
spread  reactions  like  that  which  is  now  unquestionably  manifesting  itself  against 
capitalism  do  not  occur  without  cause  or  provocation.  *  *  *  _ 

“Democracy  has  not  yet  made  the  world  safe  against  irrational  revolution. 
That  supreme  task,  which  is  nothing  less  than  the  salvation  of  civilization,  now 
faces  democracy,  insistent,  imperative.  *  *  *  The  road  that  leads  away  from 
revolution  is  clearly  marked.  *  *  * 

“The  sum  of  the  whole  matter  is  this,  that  our  civilization  cannot  survive 
materially  unless  it  be  redeemed  spiritually.  It  can  be  saved  only  by  becoming 
permeated  with  the  spirit  of  Christ  and  being  made  free  and  happy  by  the  prac¬ 
tices  which  spring  out  of  that  spirit.  Only  thus  can  discontent  be  driven  out 
and  all  the  shadows  lifted  from  the  road  ahead.  Here  is  the  final  challenge  to 
our  churches,  to  our  political  organizations,  and  to  our  capitalists — to  everyone 
who  fears  God  or  loves  his  country.  Shall  we  not  all  earnestly  cooperate  to 
bring  in  the  new  day?” 


RUSSIA  A  CHALLENGE 


1.  There  are  elements  of  value  in  the  dynamic  ideal  that 
lies  at  the  heart  of  their  purpose,  “to  suppress  all  exploita¬ 
tion  of  man  by  man,”  abolish  all  parasitic  elements  in  so¬ 
ciety;  abolish  all  secret  treaties;  free  from  enslavement 
millions  of  laborers  in  Asia,  the  colonies  and  smaller  na¬ 
tions ;  obtain  self-determination  for  oppressed  nationalities; 
liberty  of  conscience,  full  liberty  of  association ;  a  complete 
education  free  for  all,  and  the  ultimate  equality  of  sW. 
citizens  regardless  of  race  and  nationality.  They  aim  to 
end  the  domination  of  capitalism,  make  war  impossible, 
wipe  out  state  boundaries,  transform  the  whole  world  into 
a  co-operative  commonwealth,  and  bring  about  real  human 
brotherhood  and  freedom.”1  We  do  not  claim  that  Russia 
has  fulfilled  its  ideal,  nor  carried  out  the  pledges  of  its  Con¬ 
stitution.  But,  consciously  or  unconsciously,  there  are  many 
Christian  elements  in  their  purpose  and  ideal  of  brotherhood. 

2.  Here  is  the  first  labor  government  in  the  world,  on 
such  a  scale,  planned  and  executed  for  the  benefit  of.  the 
laboring  masses.  Though  still  hampered  for  lack  of  funds, 
and  unable  to  carry  out  all  the  provisions  of  their  legislation, 
perhaps  no  other  country  has  such  favorable  labor  laws  and 
such  methods  for  the  assistance  and  benefit  of  the  majority 
of  the  population  that  make  up  the  toiling  masses,  especially 
of  the  industrial  workers. 

3.  They  have  made  provision  for  art ,  music  and  the  whole 
aesthetic  side  of  life;  for  athletics,  sports  and  recreation 
for  the  development  and  expression  of  the  working  masses 
as  no  other  government  in  the  world  has  done. 

4.  Russia  has  more  completely  realized  an  industrial  revo¬ 
lution  than  any  other  country.  For  five  thousand  years, 


1  From  the  Manifesto  of  the  Third  Moscow  International,  and  Declaration  of 
Rights  of  the  Third  All-Russian  Soviet  Congress.  .  .  .A  ,  , 

The  communism  found  in  the  early  Christian  Church  was  sPiryuM  and 
voluntary  in  a  small  homogeneous  and  prepared  community,  while  that  in  Russia 
is  materialistic  and  enforced  in  a  vast  heterogeneous  empire.  In  Acts  11:  44-46 
and  IV:  32-35  we  read:  “The  believers  all  kept  together;  they  shared  all  they 
had  with  one  another,  they  would  sell  their  possessions  and  goods  and  distribute 
the  proceeds  among  all,  as  any  one  might  be  in  need.  Day  after  day  they 
resorted  with  one  accord  to  the  temple  and  broke  bread  together  in  their  own 
homes;  they  ate  with  a  glad  and  simple  heart  .  .  .  Now  there  was  but  one 

heart  and  soul  among  the  multitude  of  the  believers;  not  one  of  them  considered 
anything  his  personal  property;  they  shared  all  they  had  with  one  another. 
There  was  not  a  needy  person  among  them,  for  those  who  owned  land  or  houses 
would  sell  them  and  bring  the  proceeds  of  the  sale,  laying  the  money  before  the 
feet  of  the  apostles;  it  was  then  distributed  according  to  each  individuals  need. 
Moffatt’s  Translation. 


12 


RUSSIA  A  CHALLENGE 


13 


since  the  construction  of  the  great  Pyramid  in  Egypt,  most 
nations  have  been  exploited  in  the  interests  of  a  privileged 
minority.  Russia  is  the  first  country  to  be  exploited  for  the 
unpriviledged  masses.  Thus  Russia  constitutes  an  eco¬ 
nomic  and .  industrial  challenge,  wherever  capitalism  is  ruth¬ 
less.  In  referring  to  “ruthless  capitalism”  we  fully  recog¬ 
nize  the  legitimate  and  necessary  accumulation  of  capital 
without  which  modern  industry  cannot  be  conducted.  What 
we  mean  by  ruthless  capitalism  is  the  excessive  concentra¬ 
tion  of  power  and  privilege  as  a  result  of  vast  wealth  in 
the  hands  of  a  few ;  monopoly  of  natural  resources  for 
private  gain  at  the  expense  of  public  welfare;  autocratic 
control  of  industry;  production  for  individual  profit  and 
power  rather  than  for  social  use  and  service,  with  consequent 
extravagant  luxury  for  some  while  many  live  in  poverty 
and  want.  In  spite  of  all  its  own  evils  Russia  openly  chal¬ 
lenges  the  whole  present  capitalistic  order  with  its  vast  con¬ 
centration  of  wealth  and  poverty,  of  profiteering  and 
sweating. 

5.  Russia  also  constitutes  a  social  challenge,  for  she  has 
attempted  the  first  actual  establishment  of  a  new  social  order 
based  on  the  boldest  social  experiment  known  in  history, 
national  and  international  Communism.  From  Plato  on¬ 
ward  we  have  read  of  Utopias  and  theories  for  a  new  social 
order.  Russia  is  the  first  country  that  has  ever  attempted 
on  a  national  scale  to  carry  out  such  a  colossal  experiment. 

6.  In  spite  of  her  own  glaring  evils  and  shortcomings 
Russia  stands  as  a  political  challenge  to  every  country  and 
every  future  international  conference ;  a  challenge  to  all  im¬ 
perialism,  militarism  and  colonial  conquest  and  exploitation. 
She  has  immediate  and  powerful  influence  on  the  present 
situation  in  Turkey,  Poland,  Germany  and  much  of  Europe 
and  Asia.  Henceforth  Russia  must  be  reckoned  with. 

We  may  look  upon  Russia  as  a  vast  laboratory  for  social 
experiment.  In  a  world  fettered  and  bound  by  conservative 
custom  and  tradition,  with  its  incubus  and  inheritance  of 
medievalism  and  absolutism,  its  uncorrected  results  of  a 
laissez-faire  industrial  revolution,  its  enormous  injustices  and 
inequalities,  its  masses  often  in  poverty  and  ignorance,  with¬ 
out  adequate  opportunity  for  expression  or  self-realization, 
it  may  be  of  some  real  value  to  have  at  least  one  country 
free  to  test  certain  theories  by  a  system  of  trial  and  error. 
In  so  far  as  they  are  fit  to  survive  they  will  eventually  suc¬ 
ceed,  but  where  they  are  false  they  will  finally  fail.  If  we 


14  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 

have  open  minds  we  shall  learn  much  both  from  the  suc¬ 
cess  and  failure  of  the  good  and  the  evil  in  Russia. 

The  significance  of  Russia  is  enhanced  by  its  very  mass 
and  magnitude.  Midway  between  East  and  West,  the  Rus¬ 
sian  Empire  at  the  opening  of  the  war  contained  more  than 
one-seventh  of  the  land  surface  of  the  globe  and  about  one- 
ninth  of  its  population.1  Stretching  for  over  six  thousand 
miles,  across  Asia  and  Europe,  it  was  approximately  twice 
the  size  of  all  the  rest  of  Europe.  Siberia  alone  with  its 
vast  resources  has  an  area  one  and  a  half  times  that  of 
the  United  States,  and  if  peopled  with  the  same  density  of 
population  as  Belgium,  would  hold  almost  twice  the  present 
population  of  the  world.  When  a  state  with  such  resources 
and  with  the  largest  white  population  in  the  world  tries 
the  boldest  social  experiment  in  all  history,  it  must  be 
reckoned  with.  At  least  we  shall  not  solve  the  problem  by 
telling  lies  about  the  present  government  such  as  the  ridic¬ 
ulous  statement  that  all  women  had  been  nationalized,  or 
other  baseless  propaganda,  furnished  by  members  of  the 
old  order  dispossessed  of  their  privileges  under  the  Czar,  or 
other  interested  parties,  determined  that  a  workingman’s 
government  should  not  succeed. 

1  1915  1923 

Area  in  Square  Miles .  8,417,118  8,166,130 

Population  (estimated) .  182,182,600  131,546,045 

Large  sections  of  the  population  were  lost  to  Poland,  Finland,  Latvia, 
Esthonia,  Lithuania,  etc.  Statesman’s  Year  Book,  1923,  p.  1278. 


RUSSIA’S  PAST 


The  significance  of  the  present  movement  in  Russia  can 
only  be  adequately  understood  in  the  light  of  its  past  history. 
Russia  has  been  marked  for  suffering  for  a  thousand  years. 
It  has  been  the  land  of  autocracy  and  revolution.  Between 
the  eighth  and  thirteenth  centuries  the  land  was  laid  waste 
by  eighty-three  civil  wars.  For  the  next  two  centuries 
(1238-1467  A.  D.)  it  was  swept  by  invasion  under  the 
galling  Tartar  or  Mongol  domination;  it  was  rent  by  ninety 
internal  conflicts  and  more  than  a  hundred  and  fifty  foreign 
wars. 

Then  for  five  centuries  Russia  suffered  under  the  au¬ 
tocracy  of  the  Czars.  Ivan  the  Terrible  began  a  reign  of 
terror  which  lasted  for  twenty-five  years.  Before  the  last 
feeble  Czar,  Nicholas  II,  came  to  the  throne  in  1894,  for 
two  decades  some  thousands  of  victims  each  year  had  been 
sent  to  Siberia.  The  government  of  the  last  Czar  had  also 
banished  thousands  of  political  exiles. 

We  stood  in  Petrograd  in  the  dark  fortress  of  Peter  and 
Paul  between  the  tombs  of  the  dead  Czars  on  the  one 
hand,  and  the  cells  of  their  former  political  prisoners  on 
the  other.  For  centuries  the  finest  spirits  in  Russia  had 
cherished  their  dream  of  a  new  social  order.  They  had 
lived  for  it,  suffered  for  it  in  dungeon  and  exile,  thousands 
had  died  for  it.  They  had  dreamed  of  a  country  that  should 
be  free  of  police  and  spies,  free  from  the  caricature  of 
religion  in  a  State  Church  that  had  become  almost  an  adjunct 
of  the  police  department  and  of  the  spy  system,  free  from 
the  exploiter  and  profiteer,  from  all  autocracy,  aristocracy 
and  plutocracy.  They  had  dreamed  of  world  brotherhood, 
of  communal  well-being  in  mutual  service  without  the 
motive  of  private  profit  and  selfish  hoarding. 

We  stood  in  the  Revolutionary  Museum  in  the  Czar’s 
Winter  Palace  in  Petrograd,  where  one  sees  the  portrayal 
of  the  long  century  of  struggle  for  freedom,  from  the  revo¬ 
lution  of  1825  to  the  present.  A  blind  bureaucracy  had 
opposed  all  reformers,  suppressed  the  conquered  national¬ 
ities,  dissolved  or  treated  with  contempt  the  Duma  and 
legislative  assemblies,  outlawed  trade  unions  and  had  put 
down  peasant  revolts  and  industrial  strikes  with  bloodshed. 
The  spy  system  and  secret  police  both  in  state  and  church 
developed  into  “a  vast  secret  society  which  permeated  and 

15 


16  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 

poisoned  the  whole  of  Russian  social  life.”  This  was  the 
stern  school  of  autocracy  and  oppression  in  which  the  pres¬ 
ent  rulers  of  Russia  studied.  And  this  must  be  remembered 
in  judging  the  present  government.  Most  of  the  evils  of 
the  present  system  were  found  in  the  old  Czarist  regime 
which  our  government  officially  recognized. 

In  the  World  War  Russia  suffered  more  than  any  other 
great  nation.  Of  over  15,000,000  called  to  the  colors,  1,700,- 
000  fell  among  the  battle  dead,  and  a  total  of  over  3,000,000 
died  of  wounds,  disease,  neglect  and  starvation.  .  Betrayed 
by  their  corrupt  leaders,  left  often  without  munitions  and 
supplies  to  fight  with  sticks  and  stones,  the  morale  of  the 
troops  at  the  front  was  finally  broken,  and  the  hungry  mobs 
in  Petrograd  rose  in  bread  riots,  only  to  be  shot  down  by  the 
soldiers.  In  all  the  terrible  events  that  followed  in  the  down¬ 
fall  of  Russia  the  malign  influence  of  Germany  must  be  fully 
recognized. 


THE  REVOLUTION 


It  is  said  that  every  country  gets  the  kind  of  revolution 
it  deserves.  On  March  12,  1917,  the  first  revolution  broke 
out  in  Russia,  beginning  with  a  strike  of  the  industrial 
workers  threatened  with  starvation.  Regiments  sent  to 
crush  the  revolt  joined  the  strikers;  and  the  Czar,  Nicholas 
II,  finally  abdicated.  A  provisional  government  under 
Prince  LvofT  was  followed  by  a  new  cabinet  under  Keren¬ 
sky,  but  neither  satisfied  the  demands  of  the  people.  Liberty 
had  given  place  to  license,  discipline  was  at  an  end,  chaos 
reigned.  The  peasants  wanted  land,  the  industrial  workers 
demanded  control  of  the  factories,  there  were  constant  dem¬ 
onstrations  and  threatened  uprisings,  while  the  central  gov¬ 
ernment  was  weak  and  nerveless.  Russia  was  on  the  verge 
of  breaking  up  into  rival  revolutionary  states  in  endless  civil 
war.  One  party  alone  now  emerged  that  knew  just  what  it 
wanted  and  had  the  power  to  enforce  its  demands.1 

During  the  war,  councils  or  soviets  of  workers  were 
formed  in  the  factories,  of  peasants  in  the  country,  and 
soldiers  in  the  army.  As  the  peasants  had  not  been  given 
the  land  nor  the  town  workers  bread,  a  popular  revolt  be¬ 
gan.  This  second  Russian  Workers’  Resolution  took  place 
on  November  7,  1917.  As  soon  as  the  Petrograd  Soviet 
obtained  a  Bolshevik  majority  they  seized  the  Government 
and  handed  it  over  to  the  All-Russia  Congress  of  Soviets. 
The  Czarist  Empire  had  now  become  the  “Russian  Socialist 
Federal  Soviet  Republic.”2 

The  Bolshevist  Government  withdrew  from  what  they  re¬ 
garded  as  an  imperialist  war  and  signed  the  separate  and 
humiliating  peace  of  Brest-Litovsk.  They  then  endeavored 
to  make  the  colossal  transition  from  a  capitalist  to  a  socialist 
order.  Two  series  of  decrees  were  now  issued,  one  aiming 
at  the  destruction  of  the  old  order  and  the  other  at  the 
establishment  of  the  new  through  the  improvement  of  the 
social  conditions  of  the  people.  A  Declaration  of  Rights 

1  There  had  been  three  principal  revolutionary  groups  in  Russia,  the  Com¬ 
munist  followers  of  Marx,  the  Anarchist  followers  of  Bakunin  and  Prince 
Kropotkin,  and  the  Socialist  Revolutionaries,  one  wing  of  which  pursued  the 
policy  of  terrorism.  The  first  group  organized  the  Marxian  Social  Democratic 
Labor  Party  in  1898  among  the  town  workers.  In  the  division  which  arose  in 
the  party  the  Mensheviki  favored  co-operation  with  the  bourgeois  Liberals,  while 
the  Bolsheviki  under  Lenine  favored  the  dictatorship  of  the  proletarian  workers 
on  their  own  account. 

2  At  the  Tenth  All-Russian  Congress  of  Soviets,  December  23-27,  1922,  it  was 
decided  to  unite  all  the  Soviet  Republics  in  a  single  federal  state.  The  present 
official  name  is  the  Union  of  Socialist  Soviet  Republics  or  the  S.  S.  S.  R. 

17 


18  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 

was  passed  at  the  Third  All-Russia  Soviet  Congress  and  a 
Constitution  was  adopted  at  the  fifth  Congress.  Russia  be¬ 
came  a  Republic  of  Soviets  of  Workers,  Soldiers  and  Peas¬ 
ants.  Private  property  in  land  was  abolished,  all  land  be¬ 
coming,  in  theory  at  least,  the  common  property  of  the 
people.  The  State  declared  its  ownership  of  all  forests, 
mines,  .national  resources,  factories,  railways  and  other 
means  of  production  and  transport. 

The  Republic  became  a  free  Socialist  community  of  all 
laboring  classes.  Freedom  of  conscience,  of  opinion,  of  the 
press  and  of  meeting  were  guaranteed.  The  franchise  was 
granted  irrespective  of  religion,  nationality  or  sex  to  all 
citizens  over  eighteen  engaged  in  productive  labor ;  it  was 
denied  to  all  who  exploited  the  labor  of  others  for  profit,  or 
lived  on  unearned  income,  also  to  monks,  priests,  members 
of  the  former  police  and  criminals.  It  cannot  be  maintained 
that  all  of  the  above  ideals  or  guarantees  were  carried  into 
practice.  Religious  liberty,  for  instance,  was  hedged  about 
with  many  restrictions.  Russia  is  the  only  country  which 
the  writer  has  visited  in  thirty  years  where  no  Student  Chris¬ 
tian  Movement  is  as  yet  permitted. 

The  Bolshevist  Revolution  was  accomplished  with  remark¬ 
ably  little  bloodshed  and  employees  and  men  of  all  classes 
were  invited  to  co-operate  with  the  new  government.  With 
the  beginning  of  the  destruction  of  the  old  capitalist  regime 
and  the  erection  of  a  new  social  order,  almost  the  entire 
bourgeois,  professional  and  technically  skilled  class  went  on 
strike,  adopted  the  method  of  sabotage,  and  organized  a 
counter-revolutionary  movement  with  the  aid  of  foreign 
powers.  Fighting  now  for  their  very  existence  and  the 
principles  of  the  revolution,  the  government  replied  by  the 
Extraordinary  Commission  and  the  terror,  which,  however, 
was  abolished  as  soon  as  counter-revolutionary  activity 
ceased.  We  make  no  defence  of  this  terror,  any  more  than 
we  do  of  that  of  the  French  Revolution.  Its  severity  can 
hardly  be  exaggerated. 


MILITARY  COMMUNISM 


For  three  years  private  shops  were  closed  and  there  was 
almost  no  buying  and  selling.  A  period  of  “military  com¬ 
munism”  was  instituted  in  which  the  state  tried  to  organize 
the  whole  life  of  the  people  on  a  communal  basis.  The 
peasants’  entire  surplus  grain  was  taken  by  the  state  for  the 
support  of  the  army,  the  industrial  workers  and  the  rest  of 
the  population. 

Private  property  and  trade  were  now  to  be  replaced  by 
the  free  exchange  of  the  products  of  industry  for  food  from 
the  country.  But  when  industry  ceased  effectively  to  pro¬ 
duce,  the  burden  of  the  support  of  the  population  fell  upon 
the  peasants,  who  had  all  their  surplus  crops  taken  from 
them.  To  eliminate  the  money  power  of  the  bourgeoisie, 
paper  currency  was  deliberately  debased  by  a  flood  of  paper 
money  which  soon  became  worthless  and  which  the  peasants 
were  unwilling  to  receive.  Peasant  uprisings  began  to  in¬ 
crease  and  the  area  cultivated  was  reduced  to  half  what  it 
had  been  before  the  war. 

Resenting  this  forcible  seizure  of  their  grain,  the  peas¬ 
ants  ceased  to  raise  more  than  they  needed  for  themselves 
and  the  government  was  now  compelled  to  face  a  world  of 
enemies  from  without  and  within  the  country.  For  six 
years  they  were  forced  to  meet  obstacles  and  opposition  un¬ 
paralleled  in  history.  They  had  inherited  the  corruption  of 
five  centuries  of  Czardom.  The  country  was  exhausted  by 
the  war  and  impoverished  by  a  world  blockade.  It  was 
crushed  by  Germany  in  the  Brest-Litovsk  Treaty.  It  suf¬ 
fered  from  invasion,  as  it  had  to  fight  against  the  Central 
Powers,  the  English,  French,  Japanese,  Czecho-Slovaks, 
Poles,  Finns,  Greeks,  and  Roumanians.  Even  an  American 
army  invaded  their  territory. 

The  white  armies  of  Denikin,  Kolchak,  Yudenich,  Kras- 
noff,  Semenoff,  Wrangel,  Petlura,  Balakhovitch  and  the 
Cossacks  were  not  only  fighting  but  some  of  them  were 
perpetrating  atrocities  upon  the  helpless  inhabitants  equal  to 
anything  in  history.  Under  the  White  Terror  in  Finland 
alone  out  of  a  small  population  of  3,000,000  some  17,000 
are  said  to  have  perished.  In  the  meantime  Russia  was 
devastated  by  red  and  white  terror  alike. 

After  six  years  of  warfare  following  1914,  Russia  col¬ 
lapsed  in  sheer  exhaustion.  She  was  devastated  by  war 

19 


20  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 

and  revolution,  swept  by  vast  epidemics,  bankrupt  and 
threatened  with  chaos.  Following  all  this  came  the  awful 
famine  of  1921.  The  American  Relief  Administration  re¬ 
ported  23,895,000  starving  out  of  a  population  of  42,000,- 
000  in  the  famine  area.1  Reliable  witnesses  informed  the 
writer  that  frozen  corpses,  dogs  and  even  children  were 
eaten  by  persons  frenzied  by  hunger.  Some  three  millions 
are  said  to  have  perished  of  starvation  and  a  total  of  not 
less  than  ten  millions  from  all  causes  of  war,  revolution, 
famine  and  disease. 

In  the  face  of  such  titanic  obstacles  the  policy  of  mili¬ 
tary  communism  broke  down.  Russia  had  attempted  to 
pass  at  a  bound  from  primitive  agriculture  and  a  disorgan¬ 
ized  industrial  system  to  State  Socialism  and  Communism. 
This  was  impossible.  The  new  state  had  destroyed  its  credit. 
With  the  abolition  of  private  wealth  there  was  almost  noth¬ 
ing  left  to  tax,  for  state  industries  were  running  at  a  loss. 
A  flood  of  paper  money  to  pay  the  government’s  bills  ruined 
the  currency.  The  workers  were  for  a  time  demoralized  by 
the  new  license.  Even  school  children  had  their  committees 
for  running  the  schools,  as  the  soldiers  tried  to  run  the  army 
and  the  workers  the  factories.  But  all  reserves  were  soon 
exhausted,  and  the  state  could  not  even  provide  adequate 
food  rations  to  keep  the  workers  from  hunger.  The  period 
of  destruction  was  at  an  end. 

1  The  A.  R.  A.  reported  nearly  15,000,000  fed,  12,000  medical  institutions 
assisted,  7,000,000  persons  inoculated  or  vaccinated,  912,121  tons  of  food  im¬ 
ported,  and  a  total  expenditure  of  some  $75,000,000.  The  work  of  the  A.  R.  A. 
was  beyond  all  praise  and  has  left  an  enduring  gratitude  in  the  hearts  of  the 
Russian  people  that  will  have  an  important  influence  upon  the  future  relations  of 
these  two  great  nations. 


THE  NEW  ECONOMIC  POLICY 


The  Communist  leaders  received  the  shock  of  a  rude 
awakening  when  there  was  a  peasant  uprising  in  the  province 
of  Tambov,  and  the  fortress  of  Cronstadt  revolted.  Pro¬ 
duction  in  industry  had  fallen  to  a  desperate  fraction  of 
the  pre-war  basis  and  of  the  national  needs.1 

The  government  had  failed  and  confessed  it.2  Lenine 
and  his  colleagues  had  the  sagacity  to  see  it  in  time,  frankly 
admit  their  failure,  and  turn  right  about  face,  in  the  adop¬ 
tion  of  “The  New  Economic  Policy.” 

The  new  economic  policy  embraced:  1.  The  substitution 
for  the  requisition  of  all  the  peasants’  surplus  grain  by  a 
definite  food  tax,  taking  a  maximum  of  20  per  cent  of  his 
crop.  2.  Freedom  of  trade  within  Russia.  3.  The  dena¬ 
tionalization  of  small  business,  the  revival  of  private  small 
capitalist  production,  and  of  banks  and  shops  on  a  profit¬ 
making  basis.  Also  the  leasing  of  the  majority  of  state- 
controlled  enterprises.  4.  The  concentration  of  state  con¬ 
trol  to  the  more  important  nationalized  industries,  and  their 
combination  in  autonomous  state  “trusts”  under  the  Su¬ 
preme  Economic  Council.  5.  The  institution  of  a  State 
Bank  and  the  encouragement  of  the  Co-operative  Societies 
which  had  been  temporarily  absorbed  by  the  state.3 


1Larin,  the  Communist  economist,  contrasted  the  production  of  1920  with  1914 
as  follows:  The  production  of  coal  had  declined  75  per  cent,  petroleum  67,  gold 
88,  cast  iron  97.6,  iron  and  steel  96,  cotton  and  wool  80,  rubber  98  and  chemicals 

89.6  per  cent.  ,  ,  ,  . .  .....  . 

2  See  Izvestia,  August  11,  1921.  Lenine  frankly  said:  We  can  only  con¬ 
tinue  to  exist  by  making  an  appeal  to  the  peasants  ..  .  .  The  role  of  the  pro- 
letariat  in  such  a  situation  is  to  supervise  and  guide  these  small  farmers  in  their 
transition  to  socialized,  collective,  communal  labor  ...  Ten  years  at  least, 
and,  in  view  of  our  present  ruin,  probably  more  will  be  required  for  this  transi¬ 
tion  .  .  .  We  must  decide  which  of  two  policies  we  shall  choose.  Either  we 
forbid  absolutely  every  private  exchange  of  goods  or  we  take  the  trouble  to 
make  it  a  state  capitalism  .  .  .  State  capitalism  is  a  step  forward  toward 

the  destruction  of  the  small  bourgeois  attitude  .  .  .  The  kernel  of  the  situa¬ 
tion  is  that  one  must  find  a  means  of  directing  the  evolution  of  capitalism  in  the 
bed  of  state  capitalism  so  as  to  insure  the  transition  of  state  capitalism  into 


Socialism.”  _ „ 

3  See  Statesman’s  Year  Book  1923,  p.  1286.  The  sweeping  changes  m  the 
policy  and  laws  of  Soviet  Russia  are  shown  by  the  following:  November  14, 
1917,  Decree  giving  Workers’  Committees  complete  control  of  all  industries; 
May’  1921,  Law  repealed,  individual  management  restored;  November  24,  1917, 
Decree  abolishing  all  existing  courts  and  legal  institutions,  Extraordinary  Com¬ 
mission  or  Cheka  established;  January,  1922,  New  system  of  courts  established, 
Cheka  abolished;  December  14,  1917,  all  banks  closed,  nationalized  and  assets 
confiscated;  December,  1921,  new  bank  law  passed  and  State  Bank  with  branches 
established;  August  20,  1918,  nationalization  of  land,  prohibiting  private  owner¬ 
ship  of  real  estate;  June  1,  1922,  Decree  passed  giving  perpetual  right  to  posses¬ 
sion  and  right  to  inherit  same;  June  29,  1918,  all  industries  nationalized;  June, 
1922,  many  smaller  industries  surrendered.  Owners  given  perference  in  leasing 
others  on  long-time  leases,  50  to  100  years,  etc.  . 

Ex-Governor  Goodrich,  of  Indiana,  “The  Evolution  of  Soviet  Russia,  p.  223. 


21 


22  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 


It  is  only  fair  to  say  that  the  “new”  economic  policy  was 
in  fact  a  frank  retreat,  and  in  part  a  return  to  the  old 
methods  of  capitalism  which  had  been  so  condemned.  The 
government  has  not,  however,  abandoned  its  ideal  and  aim. 
The  present  policy  is  only  a  temporary  concession.  Their 
plan  is  State  Capitalism  now,  State  Socialism  as  soon  as 
possible,  and  ultimately  pure  Communism  that  proposes  to 
obviate  state  control. 

History  proves,  however,  that  once  this  ground  is  sur¬ 
rendered  it  will  be  difficult  to  recover.  In  Rome  under  the 
Republic  and  the  Empire  no  citizen  ever  held  title  to  his 
land  as  a  personal  possession.  Under  English  law  all  the 
land  theoretically  belongs  to  the  crown,  but  this  is  now 
a  mere  fiction  and  it  would  be  fatal  to  try  and  reclaim 
it.  When  the  peasants  of  Russia  have  long  possessed  the 
land,  when  private  industry  has  been  re-established,  when 
leases  have  been  made  to  private  capitalists  and  concessions 
granted  to  foreign  governments  for  recognition,  when  Russia 
comes  again  into  the  family  of  nations  with  the  constant 
influence  and  pressure  of  the  rest  of  the  world  upon  her,  it 
will  be  difficult  if  not  impossible  for  one  nation  to  live  under 
an  economy  of  pure  communism  if  all  the  rest  of  the  world 
is  upon  a  basis  of  unrestricted  capitalism. 

In  the  meantime,  the  Soviet  Government  maintains  an 
almost  absolute  political  and  economic  control.  It  retains 
the  monopoly  of  foreign  trade,  the  control  of  basic  indus¬ 
tries,  the  railways,  the  banking  system  and  of  most  prop¬ 
erty.  A  new  capitalist  class  is  again  springing  up  under  the 
present  system  of  private  trading. 

In  spite  of  all  its  concessions,  the  new  economic  policy, 
while  it  has  succeeded  superficially  in  stimulating  trade  upon 
the  surface,  has  not  as  yet  restored  production  to  its  pre¬ 
war  level  nor  attracted  a  large  amount  of  capital,  either  for¬ 
eign  or  domestic.  Within  Russia  there  is  not  much  private 
capital  left  to  attract.  Its  pre-war  estimated  wealth  of  only 
$40,000,000,000  has  been  reduced  to  little  more  than  half. 
Russia’s  greatest  economic  needs  at  the  moment  are  capital, 
credit  and  confidence,  but  she  is  slowly  gaining  ground  in 
all  three. 


THE  PRESENT  GOVERNMENT 


As  we  have  seen,  the  present  government  of  Russia  is  a 
frankly  imposed  dictatorship.  It  does  not  profess  to  be  a 
democracy  for  all.  Theoretically  it  is  a  “Government  of 
Workmen  and  Peasants,”  but  as  the  peasants  are  unprepared 
and  unwieldy,  highly  individualistic  instead  of  socialistic, 
Zinoviev  well  says  a  “government  of  workmen  and  peasants 
is  not  realizable.  .  .  .  The  Soviet  government  is  in  fact 

a  workmen  s  government.”  That  is,  it  is  a  dictatorship  of 
the  proletariat.  But  as  the  proletariat  is  for  the  most  part 
ignorant  and  uninstructed,  and  often  dissatisfied  with  its  low 
wages,  the  dictatorship  has  to  be  in  fact  one  of  the  Com¬ 
munist  Party  of  less  than  half  a  million  members,  or  a  third 
of  one  per  cent  of  the  population.  As  this  party  in  turn  is 
liable  to  get  out  of  hand,  and  as  it  needs  a  directing  brain 
and  the  control  of  an  “iron  discipline,”  there  must  be  a 
nucleus,  an  inner  group  or  guiding  center.  This  is  found  in 
the  Political  Bureau  of  the  Communist  Party.  Here  is  the 
invisible  government  and  the  directing  mind  and  will  of  the 
whole  machine.  It  is  composed  of  seven  men,  with  three 
associates.  Here  is  the  motor  brain  center  of  the  whole  body 
which  determines  the  general  policy  and  program  of  the 
party  and  makes  the  more  important  assignments  of  positions. 

This  invisible  government  functions  through  the  Commu¬ 
nist  Party.  The  Communists  are  distributed  in  strategic  posi¬ 
tions  everywhere  and  aim  to  have  a  party  “cell”  in  all  political 
and  industrial  organizations.  Before  every  meeting  the 
Communists  hold  a  private  caucus.  The  questions  at  issue 
are  fully  discussed  and  a  vote  is  taken.  The  decision  of  the 
majority  is  binding  and  under  an  iron  party  discipline  the 
Communist  members  enter  the  public  meeting  to  vote,  speak 
and  act  as  a  unit.  As  they  are  the  one  body  that  knows  just 
what  it  wants,  as  they  have  thought  through  the  questions  at 
issue,  and  as  their  dominant  purpose  is  usually  the  workers’ 
welfare,  they  generally  carry  the  meeting,  especially  as  voting 
must  be  “open”  and  as  opposition  in  the  past  has  been  known 
to  be  dangerous. 

Professor  Harper,  of  Chicago  University,  in  the  Interna¬ 
tional  Interpreter  states  that  although  there  are  not  enough 
Communists  to  go  around,  they  constitute  a  vast  bureaucracy. 
They  control,  all  the  more  effectively  because  not  always  ob¬ 
viously,  not  only  the  central,  provincial  and  local  government 

23 


24  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 


bodies,  but  the  principal  trade  unions,  the  central  Cooperative 
Society,  the  red  army  of  some  600,000,  the  directorate  of  the 
more  important  industrial  enterprises,  the  entire  press,  83 
per  cent  of  the  provincial  judges,  the  prosecuting  attorneys — ■ 
in  short,  everything  that  is  worth  controlling  in  the  cities. 
In  the  last  All-Russian  Congress  of  Soviets  there  were  1,154 
Communists  and  only  63  “non-party”  men  out  of  a  total  of 
1,217  delegates.  They  continue  to  rule  by  a  combination  of 
force  and  sagacity.  They  are  masters  of  propaganda,  pub¬ 
licity  and  diplomacy.  The  peasants  are  their  unsolved  prob¬ 
lem.  The  110,853,734  rural  inhabitants  are  too  numerous, 
too  widely  scattered,  and,  since  the  war,  too  sturdy  and  inde¬ 
pendent  to  be  thus  tamely  and  paternally  controlled.  The 
final  issue  in  Russia  may  be  between  the  industrial  Com¬ 
munist  Party  and  a  peasants’  republic. 

The  Communist  Party  rules  through  the  Soviet  system.  A 
soviet  is  simply  a  committee  or  council.  Every  body  has  its 
soviet.  Each  trade  and  profession,  all  workers  by  hand  or 
brain,  whether  mechanics,  teachers  or  lawyers ;  all  soldiers, 
workmen  and  peasants ;  each  factory,  village,  town,  city, 
province  or  republic  has  its  representative  committee  or 
soviet.  This  system  may  be  truly  democratic  and  representa¬ 
tive,  or  it  may  be  paternally  controlled.  It  is  in  accord  with 
the  democratic  genius  of  the  Russian  people  and  will  doubt¬ 
less  be  permanent  in  Russia  whether  the  Communist  Party 
continues  to  dominate  a  socialist  state,  or  whether  it  is  finally 
overthrown  by  a  peasant  republic,  or  is  democratically  modi¬ 
fied  in  that  direction,  which  now  seems  more  probable. 

According  to  the  new  Soviet  Constitution  the  Communist 
Party  operates  through  the  Soviet  system  as  follows :  There 
is  at  the  top  (save  for  the  invisible  government  of  the  Polit¬ 
ical  Bureau  of  the  Communist  Party  which  must  never  be 
forgotten)  a  visible  cabinet  of  some  21  members,  called  the 
Presidium  of  the  Executive  Committee.  This  body  can  bring 
anyone  to  trial,  or  veto  action  of  any  local  or  state  parlia¬ 
ment.  Next,  there  is  the  Executive  Committee,  which  is 
really  a  parliament  of  three  or  four  hundred  members,  com¬ 
posed  of  two  houses.  The  senate  or  upper  house  is  the 
Council  of  Nationalities  composed  of  five  men  from  each 
state  of  the  S.  S.  R.,  or  Union  of  Soviet  Republics.  There 
is  also  a  lower  house  elected  according  to  states.  These  two 
bodies  each  elect  seven  members  to  the  Presidium,  and  seven 
others  are  chosen  by  cooption. 

Subject  to  the  Executive  Committee,  or  Parliament,  are 


THE  PRESENT  GOVERNMENT  25 

some  sixteen  Commissariats,  or  government  departments,  or 
ministries,  such  as  Defence,  Foreign  Affairs,  Foreign  Trade, 
Posts  and  Telegraphs,  the  Police  or  “G.  P.  U.”  which  is 
under  the  legal  department  as  a  regular,  and  very  important, 
department  of  state. 

Each  state  or  republic  has  its  own  parliament,  is  supposed 
to  be  independent,  and,  theoretically,  can  leave  or  secede  when 
it  wishes.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  Russia  is  a  highly  centralized 
paternal  state.  It  is  neither  a  democracy  nor  an  autocracy, 
but  an  oligarchy,  practically  controlled  by  a  small  group. 
Lenine  has  long  been  the  head  of  the  Council  of  Commissars 
and  Kalinin  the  President  of  the  Central  Executive  Commit¬ 
tee.  Lenine  has  broken  down  physically  and  his  work  is  fin¬ 
ished.  Though  greatly  revered,  he  is  hardly  missed,  for  Rus¬ 
sia  is  not,  and  never  has  been,  a  one-man  government.  The 
men  who  dominate  the  movement  at  present  are  Trotsky, 
Kamenev,  Zenoviev  and  Stalin,  who  is  often  a  spokesman  for 
the  party. 

Stalin  thus  defines  the  system,  “The  governmental  author¬ 
ity  is  the  mass  apparatus  uniting  the  working  class,  which  is 
in  power  in  the  person  of  its  party,  with  the  peasantry,  thus 
making  it  possible  for  the  working  class,  in  the  person  of  its 
party,  to  direct  the  peasantry.”1  The  highly  centralized 
groups  of  the  party  have  a  “monopoly  of  legality”  and  con¬ 
trol  the  530  newspapers  with  their  very  limited  circulation. 
The  whole  system  provides  for  wide  representation  and  free¬ 
dom  of  discussion,  with  highly  centralized  effective  control 
by  experts.  But  “the  party”  permits  no  effective  opposition 
nor  democratic  control.  This  is  at  once  its  strength  and 
weakness.  There  is  but  one  party.  It  has  been  sustained 
thus  far  by  the  enthusiasm  of  the  revolutionary  psychology, 
by  rigid  discipline  and  where  necessary  by  the  use  of  force. 

The  Cheka,  or  secret  tribunal  of  the  period  of  the  terror, 
has  been  replaced  by  the  state  political  department  with  re¬ 
duced  powers.  As  the  government  has  become  more  secure, 
it  has  relaxed  its  more  oppressive  control,  yet  in  July,  1923, 
it  extended  its  criminal-code  to  include  under  counter-revolu¬ 
tionary  activity  all  “attempts  to  overthrow,  undermine  or 
weaken”  the  authority  of  the  government. 

According  to  the  statement  of  Trotsky  to  the  Twelfth  Con¬ 
gress  of  the  Communist  Party  in  April,  1923,  the  hopes  of 
the  government  are  based  upon  four  elements:  1,  The  dic- 

1  Quoted  by  Prof.  S.  N.  Harper  in  the  International  Interpreter,  November 
3,  1923. 


26  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 

tatorship  of  the  Communist  Party ;  2,  the  red  army ;  3,  the 
nationalization  of  production ;  4,  the  monopoly  of  foreign 
trade.  To  these  might  be  added  their  recruiting  from  the 
candidates  in  the  Young  Communist  Party.  Thus  Luna¬ 
charsky,  Commissar  of  Education,  says,  “The  Communist 
Youth  is  ours  ...  to  drive  its  class  enemy  out  of  the 
schools,  proletarianizing  the  higher  and  secondary  schools.” 

It  is  in  the  light,  not  of  its  profession  of  words  and  phrases 
but  of  its  practice  that  the  system  must  be  judged.  It  aims 
at  “brotherhood,”  but  its  conception  is  a  whole  spiritual 
world  removed  from  that  of  an  all-inclusive  human  brother¬ 
hood,  in  the  light  of  a  divine  Fatherhood,  bound  together  by 
the  universal  law  of  love,  including  even  enemies,  which 
Jesus  taught.  According  to  Lenine  the  class  war  must  be 
a  civil  war  and  “revolution  is  unthinkable  without  force  and 
violence.”  According  to  Joffe,  lying  to  the  class  enemy  is  a 
proletarian  virtue.  We  have  thus  a  “brotherhood”  of  work¬ 
ingmen  based  upon  a  hatred  of  capitalists ;  a  brotherhood 
which  counts  it  a  duty  to  hate  and  to  kill  its  class  enemy. 
The  word  “love”  was  absent  from  the  vocabulary  which  the 
writer  heard  in  Russia.1 

2  Russia  constitutes  a  warning  and  a  challenge  to  every  country  that  permits 
class,  racial  and  religious  hatred  to  prepare  the  ground  for  a  class  war.  The 
class  war  was  no  outdoor  sport  in  Russia.  Several  hundred  thousand  have 
perished  there  in  the  red  and  the  white  terror.  In  the  face  of  such  an  example, 
how  pathetic  it  is  to  see  a  class  war  begun  on  the  free  soil  of  America  by  the 
secret  order  of  the  Ku  Klux  Klan.  This  nation  conceived  in  liberty  and  dedi¬ 
cated  to  the  proposition  that  all  men  are  created  free  and  equal,  now  witnesses 
the  sad  spectacle  of  Protestant  Americans  appealing  to  racial  and  religious 
hatred  by  sordid  propaganda  against  the  Jew,  against  the  Catholic,  against  the 
Negro,  against  the  foreigner,  and  against  the  liberal.  Many  of  those  who  belong 
to  this  “invisible  empire”  are  earnest  and  well  meaning  just  as  many  were  who 
took  part  in  the  Inquisition,  the  burning  of  witches,  slavery  and  other  evils  that 
have  afflicted  humanity.  But  however  well  meaning,  if  persisted  in  it  will  send 
our  free  and  united  commonwealth  into  the  jealous  factions  of  a  class  war. 
Russia  stands  as  a  warning  where  this  may  lead. 


RUSSIAN  INDUSTRY 


The  writer  spent  most  of  his  time  in  Russia  investigating 
labor  conditions,  visiting  factories,  interviewing  officials, 
trade  union  leaders  and  representatives  of  the  public  concern¬ 
ing  industrial  problems. 

Apart  from  the  independent  republics,  Russia  has  but 
7,78 5  factories  with  1,744,000  workers,  or  little  more  than 
Japan  or  India.  According  to  official  figures  there  were 
1,180,000  less  industrial  workers  in  1923  than  in  1913. 

Trotsky  in  his  report  to  the  Twelfth  Congress  of  the  Com¬ 
munist  Party  in  1923  stated  that  the  total  income  from  indus¬ 
try  and  agriculture  in  1922  was  only  60  per  cent  of  what  it 
was  in  1913.  While  the  agricultural  income  was  approxi¬ 
mately  two-thirds  of  the  pre-war  standard  that  from  industry 
had  fallen  from  $2,200,000,000  in  1913  to  $650,000,000  in 
1922,  or  less  than  one-third  of  its  pre-war  value. 

The  gold  value  of  the  money  in  circulation  is  approximately 
only  one-tenth  what  it  was  before  the  war.  Russia’s  chief 
resources  lie  in  grain,  timber,  coal,  iron,  oil,  gold,  platinum, 
manganese,  flax  and  cotton.1  In  all  of  these,  production  has 
fallen  off  greatly.  Compared  to  the  pre-war  standard  of 
1913,  Russia’s  production  in  1922,  according  to  the  most 
reliable  statistics  obtainable,  was  as  follows :  Oil,  49  per 
cent,  salt  36,  coal  34,  electro-technical  supplies  26,  wool  27, 
chemicals  21,  matches  20,  paper  17,  sugar  12,  glass  9,  plat¬ 
inum  15,  gold  7,  brass  3.5,  steel  7.4,  pig  iron  3.9,  iron  ore  2.2, 
plows  and  reapers  6,  railway  carriages  only  4  per  cent  of  pre¬ 
war  production. 

It  must  be  remembered  that  Russia  is  still  a  primitive  agri¬ 
cultural  country,  more  than  a  century  behind  Western  Europe 
in  its  cultural  standards,  and  that  only  in  recent  decades  had 
it  witnessed  the  beginning  of  an  industrial  revolution  and  the 
development  of  its  wealth. 

In  visiting  Russian  factories  we  selected  first  certain  na¬ 
tionalized  rubber  works  in  Petrograd  and  Moscow.  The 
total  production  of  each  factory  was  about  one-third  of  its 
pre-war  output.  The  individual  worker,  owing  to  the  dis¬ 
organization  of  industry,  produces  from  50  to  60  per  cent 

1  Before  the  War  Russia  stood  sixth  among  the  nations  of  the  world  in  the 
production  of  coal,  second  in  petroleum,  fourth  in  iron,  and  provided  nine-tenths 
of  the  world’s  supply  of  platinum.  Russia  took  first  place  in  the  production  of 
rye,  second  in  wheat  and  oats,  and  third  in  the  number  of  cattle,  and  second  in 
her  railway  system  of  42,504  miles.  Russia  is  a  land  of  raw  products  and  vast 
potential  wealth. 


27 


28  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 

of  what  he  did  before  the  war.  In  one  factory  the  workers 
had  been  reduced  from  18,000  to  8,000.  Industry  as  a  whole 
has  been  constitutionalized  and  each  factory  had  its  printed 
constitution  or  standard  contract  sent  from  Moscow,  and 
worked  upon  the  basis  of  a  signed  agreement  between  the 
government  “Trust”  of  the  industry  on  the  one  hand  and 
the  workers’  trade  union  on  the  other. 

There  was  a  thorough  organization  both  of  workers  and 
management  under  a  government  constitution  with  elaborate 
provision  for  the  settlement  of  disputes  and  conflicts.  There 
was  a  local  trade  union  committee  in  each  factory ;  a  conflict 
committee  composed  of  half  workers  and  half  management; 
a  district  council  to  which  appeal  could  be  made,  and  final 
arrangement  for  arbitration.  Practically  all  disagreements 
were  settled  before  reaching  the  stage  of  strikes,  which,  how¬ 
ever,  were  not  forbidden  as  a  last  resort. 

The  management  and  technical  staff  were  men  of  the  old 
regime  working  loyally  with  the  new  order.  Labor  showed 
a  will  to  work ;  there  was  evidence  of  discipline  and  of  def¬ 
erence  paid  to  the  management  on  the  part  of  the  workers. 
Labor’s  interference  with  management  and  the  workers’ 
control  of  two  years  before  had  almost  entirely  ceased. 

The  wages  of  the  workers,  which  were  chiefly  on  a  piece¬ 
work  basis,  ran  from  $6.50  to  $45.00  a  month  in  Petrograd, 
and  from  $10.00  to  $50.00  in  Moscow.  Highly  skilled  work¬ 
ers  received  about  a  dollar  a  day.  The  working  day  had  been 
reduced  from  10  hours  before  the  war  to  8  hours.  Condi¬ 
tions  for  the  workers  in  the  factories  were  excellent. 

Approximately  28  per  cent  of  the  wage  bill  of  each  factory 
was  set  aside  for  social  insurance  for  the  workers.  There 
were  so  many  taxes  and  restrictions  that  at  present  there  was 
no  indication  that  the  factories  were  making  a  profit  for  the 
state.  The  cost  of  the  product  was  about  double  that  of  pre¬ 
war  days,  the  cost  of  living  was  also  doubled,  the  real  wages 
of  the  workers  were  less,  and  the  profit  of  the  factory  had 
disappeared.  Too  many  cooks  tended  to  spoil  the  broth. 
The  moral  standards  of  the  workers  were  not  high. 
Throughout  the  factories  we  noticed  signs,  “Discharge  for 
Theft,”  and  observed  that  we  ourselves  and  all  workers  were 
searched  on  leaving  the  factory  to  see  if  we  had  any  stolen 
goods  upon  us.  In  the  state  flour  mills  employees  stole  so 
much  of  the  flour  that  profits  vanished  and  some  were  offered 
to  their  former  owners  or  to  private  capitalists.  This  may 
be  attributed  to  long-continued  poverty,  a  period  of  lawless- 


RUSSIAN  INDUSTRY’  29 

ness,  and  to  the  confessed  materialism  and  dictatorship  of  the 
present  regime. 

Nevertheless,  in  production,  in  method  and  in  relation¬ 
ships,  conditions  were  steadily  if  slowly  improving  every¬ 
where.  Two  years  ago  nearly  all  writers  like  H.  G.  Wells 
and  Sokoloff  were  speaking  of  industry  as  being  “rapidly 
ruined”  and  of  impending  disaster.  There  is  evidence  now 
of  progressive  adjustment  and  adaptation  and  the  promise 
of  stable  and  permanent  success  in  industry. 

In  textile  factories  we  found  wages  running  from  ap¬ 
proximately  $4.00  to  $30.00  a  month,  or  from  seventeen 
cents  to  a  dollar  a  day.  We  met  one  director  receiving 
$1.25  a  day.  The  real  wages  of  the  workers  were  about 
65  per  cent  of  the  pre-war  standard.  Production  in  the 
individual  factory  had  fallen  off  from  10  to  20  per  cent 
of  the  pre-war  level  but  was  much  better  than  two  years 
ago.  In  the  textile  industry  as  a  whole,  however,  produc¬ 
tion  is  scarcely  a  fifth  of  what  it  was  in  1913. 

The  average  wage  for  all  Russia  for  an  unskilled  worker 
in  1916  was,  according  to  Stroumiline,  $141.60  a  year,  or 
$11.75  a  month;  it  was  only  $77.50  a  year,  or  $6.41  a 
month,  in  1923,  in  spite  of  the  high  cost  of  living.  This 
means  an  average  of  about  25  cents  a  day. 

Concerning  the  settlement  of  labor  disagreements  we 
found  more  disputes  and  less  strikes  in  Russia  than  in 
almost  any  other  industrial  country.  The  right  to  strike 
is  maintained  both  in  state  and  private  enterprises,  but 
recourse  to  arbitration  is  compulsory  before  a  strike  can  be 
declared. 

In  spite  of  low  wages  in  Russia  today  the  cost  of  liv¬ 
ing  is  much  higher  than  before  the  war.  My  first  meal 
in  a  Moscow  hotel  with  two  courses  for  two  persons  cost 
over  $5.00  gold.  A  pair  of  shoe  laces  cost  me  65,000,000 
rubles.  The  face  value  of  this  before  the  war  would  have 
been  a  fortune  of  $32,500,000,  but  with  rubles  at  480,- 
000,000  to  the  dollar,  and  falling  daily,  the  cost  of  the 
shoe  laces  in  American  money  was  about  thirteen  cents. 
My  first  street  car  fare  was  26,000,000  rubles.  For  half 
a  large  loaf  of  bread  I  paid  96,000,000  rubles.  A  pound 
of  tea  costs  from  $1.00  to  $4.00,  or  over  480,000,000  rubles, 
and  a  cheap  suit  of  clothes  12,000,000,000. 

The  writer  found  much  discontent  among  unskilled  and 
poorly  paid  workers  outside  the  ranks  of  the  Communist 
Party.  Within  this  favored  group,  industry,  the  govern- 


30  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 


ment,  everything  is  theirs  and  utopia  lies  just  over  the  brow 
of  the  next  hill.  The  two  chief  causes  of  complaint  on  the 
part  of  non-Communists,  however,  were  poor  pay  and  lack 
of  liberty.  Voting  is  not  by  secret  ballot  but  openly.  Any¬ 
one  is  free  to  oppose  if  he  dares  to  become  a  marked  man, 
vote  against  the  policy  of  the  Party  and  take  the  conse¬ 
quences.  The  lowered  voice  and  furtive  glance  often  bore 
witness  to  the  shadow  of  the  terror  that  still  lingers  in  the 
memory.  One  quiet  but  fearless  worker  testified  to  having 
been  imprisoned  four  times  under  the  present  government 
and  fourteen  times  in  his  lifetime,  because  he  dared  to 
stand  for  his  principles. 

We  met  no  workingmen  in  all  Russia,  however,  who, 
even  for  increased  wages,  would  be  willing  to  return  to 
the  regime  of  the  Czar  or  of  Liberalism  after  the  first 
revolution.  Poor  as  it  is,  it  remains  a  workingman’s  gov¬ 
ernment,  in  many  respects  nearer  the  people  than  any  other 
in  the  world.  Even  among  the  bourgeoisie  I  found  a  grow¬ 
ing  number  who  feel  that  their  early  sabotage  against  the 
government  was  a  great  mistake,  that  their  trust  in  futile 
British  and  French  intervention  had  been  disastrous  and 
that  there  is  no  other  possible  government  in  sight  that  can 
maintain  law  and  order.  They  say  the  whole  country  is 
sick  of  war  and  revolution,  and  that  they  should  now  loyally 
co-operate  with  the  government  in  its  present  progressive 
policy  and  hope  for  a  growing  measure  of  liberty  in  the 
future. 

The  truth  is  that  Russia  has  never  yet  known  liberty,  nor 
enjoyed  a  government  sure  enough  of  itself  and  of  its 
principles  to  allow  the  free  criticism  of  enlightened  public 
opinion  and  a  free  press.  The  entire  press  today  with  all 
its  sources  of  news  and  editorial  interpretation  of  events 
is  the  controlled  mouthpiece  of  the  state.  With  the  in¬ 
creasing  stability  and  confidence  of  the  present  government 
there  is  a  growth  of  freedom.  But  no  system  will  ever  com¬ 
mend  itself  to  well-paid,  well-housed,  educated  Anglo-Saxon 
workers  who  have  tasted  hard-won  liberty,  if  it  can  only 
maintain  itself  by  an  iron  dictatorship  of  force,  and  dare 
not  trust  truth  to  the  full  blaze  of  democratic  discussion  and 
opposition. 

The  money  of  the  new  system  is  of  three  kinds :  side  by 
side  with  the  depreciated  paper  currency  there  is  the 
stabilized  currency  upon  a  gold  basis.  One  paper  cher- 


RUSSIAN  INDUSTRY  31 

vonetz,  or  ten  gold  rubles,  is  worth  a  little  more  than  an 
English  pound,  or  a  little  less  than  $5.00.  Workmen  are 
frequently  paid,  however,  and  wage  agreements  calculated 
in  the  “tovarni,”  commodity  or  goods  ruble.  This  is  based 
upon  the  index  figure  of  fifteen**  principal  articles,  and 
represents,  therefore,  a  real  wage  which  will  always  purchase 
the  same  amount  of  supplies.  At  present  one  tovarni 
ruble  is  equivalent  to  about  two  gold  rubles  in  Moscow. 
Thus  Russia  has  already  adopted  this  scientific  method  of 
payment,  similar  to  the  plan  proposed  by  Professor  Irving 
Fisher  of  Yale  for  stabilizing  the  dollar,  which  still  seems 
distant  and  utopian  in  progressive  America. 

We  found  Russia  a  land  of  organized  labor  and  trade 
unions,  and  they  have  greater  power  than  in  any  other 
country  in  the  world.  Representation  on  the  All-Russian 
Congress  of  Soviets  is  in  the  proportion  of  one  worker  to 
every  25,000  electors  in  the  towns,  but  only  one  peasant 
to  every  125,000  from  the  provinces,  thus  giving  the  in¬ 
dustrial  workers  proportionally  five  times  as  many  delegates 
as  the  farmers.  It  is  a  workingman’s  government  and 
country. 

This  is  often  indignantly  denied  by  those  who  claim  that 
it  is  a  government  of  intellectuals,  and  that  the  workers 
are  the  mere  pawns  of  this  oligarchy,  but  in  the  estimation 
of  the  writer  this  is  not  true.  The  sources  of  information 
and  interpretation  for  most  American  visitors  and  readers 
are  the  old  dispossessed  bourgeois  class,  who  are  not  un¬ 
prejudiced  witnesses.  It  is  true  that  they  have  been  often 
cruelly  treated.  We  saw  men  of  this  class  loyally  trying  to 
work  with  the  present  government,  but  who  were  held  under 
suspicion  by  it  and  who  were  allowed  neither  employment 
within  Russia  nor  permission  to  leave  the  country.  From 
the  point  of  view  of  this  class  alone  the  present  government 
is  indeed  cruelly  unjust,  but  from  the  standpoint  of  the  long- 
exploited  masses,  it  is  a  prodigious  effort  at  emancipation 
and  justice.  Most  of  us  are  too  bitter  and  partisan,  too  near 
to  the  events  in  question  to  see  the  movement  in  perspective 
as  we  now  can  see  the  French  Revolution.  Strangely  enough 
we  now  view  this  movement  with  the  same  horror  and  in¬ 
dignation  as  the  royalists  of  France  did  the  French  Revolu¬ 
tion,  and  as  the  aristocracy  of  England  viewed  the  rebellion 

of  the  ungrateful  colonists  in  America. 

Under  the  autocratic  Czarist  regime  it  was  illegal  to  be  a 


32  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 

member  of  a  trade  union  prior  to  1905,  and  free  labor 
organizations  and  strikes  were  strictly  prohibited.  It  was 
the  power  of  repressed  organized  labor  driven  underground 
that  finally  broke  in  volcanic  upheaval,  organized  its  Soviets 
and  led  the  revolution  for  the  overthrow  of  the  old  order. 

In  February,  1917,  there  were  only  three  trade  unions  in 
Russia,  with  a  membership  of  1,385.  Upon  gaining  their 
liberty,  within  six  months  a  thousand  labor  organizations 
had  enrolled  some  two  million  members.  In  1923  there  were 
4,828,000  members,  including  workers  by  hand  and  brain 
in  industry,  agriculture,  the  professions  and  government 
employment.1 

The  personnel  of  the  Soviet  Government  is  drawn  chiefly 
from  the  ranks  of  labor.  Within  the  Communist  Party  55 
per  cent  are  from  the  industrial  workers,  30  per  cent  are 
peasants,  and  15  per  cent  are  intellectuals.  Although  four¬ 
teen  out  of  the  sixteen  Peoples’  Commissars  of  two  years 
ago  were  professional  men  or  university  graduates,  yet  this 
class  is  held  under  suspicion  unless  they  have  been  seasoned 
in  prison  or  enlisted  in  the  cause  before  the  revolution  of 
1905.  The  trade  unions  are  an  integral  part  of  the  ma¬ 
chinery  .of  state  organization.  They  have  their  represen¬ 
tatives  in  nearly  all  important  industrial  and  political  bodies. 
They  have  the  right  to  nominate  candidates  for  nearly  all 
important  offices  in  industry  or  government,  in  the  manage¬ 
ment  of  each  factory  and  trust.  By  the  Labor  Code  of 
1922  they  are  given  large  powers  in  fixing  wages,  working 
hours  and  conditions  of  labor.  Where  labor  demands,  as  it 
frequently  does,  increased  wages,  shorter  hours  or  better 
working  conditions,  labor  also,  as  represented  in  industrial 
management  and  government,  must  answer  the  question, 
Where  is  the  money  to  come  from?  As  yet  there  has  never 
been  enough  to  go  round,  never  enough  to  carry  out  the  re¬ 
forms  for  education,  social  insurance,  and  increased  wages 
which  all  desire.  The  worker  in  Russia  has  more  power 
and  less  wages  than  in  other  industrial  countries.  Thus  far 
he  has  succeeded  in  securing  favorable  labor  legislation  and 
industrial  and  political  control,  but  not  in  the  production  of 
enough  “surplus  value”  to  improve  his  economic  condition. 

Members  of  the  trade  unions  are  given  special  privilege 
in  education,  in  schools  for  workers  to  prepare  them  for  the 

1  Labor  statistics  in  this  chapter  are  taken  whenever  possible  from  the  publica¬ 
tions  of  the  All-Russian  Central  Soviet  of  Labor  Unions,  and  State  Department 
of  Labor  translated  from  the  Russian.  Numbers  1  to  6,  1923. 


RUSSIAN  INDUSTRY 


33 


universities,  to  which  they  must  be  admitted  after  a  three- 
year  course  without  examination. 

The  government  has  aimed  at  and  achieved  a  large  meas¬ 
ure  of  social  equalization.  In  general,  a  single  standard  of 
living  has  been  established.  Apart  from  a  few  secret 
profiteers  no  gross  inequalities  of  fortune  exist,  for  the 
reason  that  all  are  poor  together.  Life  has  been  levelled 
down  rather  than  up.  Lenine  and  the  Soviet  leaders  get 
a  salary  not  exceeding  two  dollars  a  day,  with  certain  al¬ 
lowances  and  privileges.  They  are  men  of  simple  life,  who 
daily  sacrifice  for  a  cause  that  has  for  them  the  force  of  a 
religion.  But  in  many  respects  the  early  decrees  and  efforts 
of  the  Party  to  achieve  power,  privilege  and  comfort  for  the 
working  class  have  failed. 

In  some  cases,  such  as  social  insurance,  the  legislation 
remains  but  is  still  partially  ineffective,  owing  to  insuffi¬ 
cient  funds.  In  other  cases  new  legislation  has  withdrawn 
the  privileges  granted  to  the  workers  which  proved  harm¬ 
ful  or  impossible  of  fulfillment.  An  example  of  this  is 
found  in  workers’  control  of  the  factories.  This  was  tried 
and  proved  a  failure  under  existing  conditions,  as  it  did 
later  in  Italy,  and  as  it  did  in  the  Russian  army  when  sol¬ 
diers’  committees  endeavored  to  take  the  place  of  the  offi¬ 
cers.  It  is  difficult  to  conduct  an  orchestra  by  a  divided 
committee  or  soviet;  some  one  has  to  beat  time  and  be  the 
sole  director  for  the  moment. 

On  November  14,  1917,  a  Workers’  Control  Decree  gave 
the  workers  almost  complete  supervision  of  industries,  in¬ 
cluding  the  purchase  and  sale  of  raw  materials  and  manu¬ 
factures.  After  disastrous  experiences  of  mismanagement, 
in  May,  1921,  the  law  was  repealed,  workers’  control  was 
abolished,  individual  management  was  restored  and  in  some 
instances  former  owners  were  put  in  charge.  On  December 
28,  1921,  the  central  committee  of  the  Communist  Party,  in 
agreement  with  the  All-Russian  Central  Council  of  Trade 
Unions,  adopted  the  following  resolution  covering  large 
scale  industry :  “Conditions  in  Russia  unquestionably  de¬ 
mand  concentration  of  all  power  in  the  hands  of  the  man¬ 
agement  of  the  factories.  The  direct  intervention  of  trade 
unions  in  the  management  of  undertakings  is  also  inad¬ 
missible.”1 

There  is  now  a  steady  evolutionary  development  of  labor 

1  Labor  Conditions  in  Soviet  Russia.  International  Labor  Office,  Geneva, 
pp.  48,  49. 


34  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 

within  revolutionary  Russia.  Forced  labor  has  been  abol¬ 
ished.  Membership  in  a  trade  union  is  no  longer  compul¬ 
sory,  but  it  is  almost  universal  because  there  are  so  many 
advantages  of  membership  and  such  limitations  placed  upon 
“free”  labor.  Strikes  are  no  longer  forbidden  as  anti¬ 
revolutionary.  Competition  is  now  resorted  to  between  the 
state  and  co-operative  and  private  industries,  while  scien¬ 
tific  management,  piece  work,  special  rewards  for  excellence 
and  many  other  devices  to  stimulate  production  are  re¬ 
sorted  to. 

There  is  also  a  growing  tendency  toward  the  recognition 
of  certain  rights  of  private  property  in  Russia..  In  a  decree 
of  the  All-Russian  Central  Executive  Council  in  May,  1922, 
citizens  were  granted  the  right  to  hold  property  which  had 
not  already  been  municipalized  and  to  transfer  it  by  rental 
contracts.  Private  persons  can  acquire  land  on  a  forty-nine- 
year  lease  from  local  authorities  and  build  upon  it.  In¬ 
dividuals  may  hold  all  movable  property,  including  capital, 
factories,  shops  and  personal  property.  Security  of  copy¬ 
right,  inventions  and  trade-marks  were  restored.  Property 
may  be  mortgaged  or  bequeathed  to  one’s  family  up  to  the 
value  of  $5,000.  Property  expropriated  by  revolutionary 
laws  was  not  restored.  But  with  increased  intercourse  and 
trade  relations  conditions  in  Russia  are  constantly  approx¬ 
imating  those  of  other  nations. 

An  impartial  perusal  of  Labor  Legislation  in  the  Labor 
Code  of  1922  reveals  the  fact  that  the  new  Government  of 
Russia  in  five  years  has  produced  a  more  advanced  body  of 
legislation  than  many  other  countries  in  a  century. 

Almost  the  first  law  passed  was  for  an  eight-hour  day 
and  a  forty-eight-hour  week,  a  law  which  a  century  after 
the  industrial  revolution  has  never  been  enacted  in  Britain 
or  America.  Work  is  limited  to  8  hours  for  day  work, 
7  for  night  work  and  6  for  unhealthy  industries.  Every 
worker  has  the  right  to  a  weekly  rest  of  42  hours,  if  possible 
on  Sunday.  Women  are  safeguarded  from  night  work, 
overtime  and  unhealthy  industries.  Provision  on  full  wages 
is  made  for  mothers  for  8  weeks  before  and  8  weeks  after 
confinement.  Creches  or  homes  are  provided  for  the  chil¬ 
dren  of  workers. 

For  young  persons  the  normal  working  day  must  not  ex¬ 
ceed  6  hours  from  16  to  18  years,  and  4  hours  for  14  to  16. 
Children  under  14  are  not  allowed  to  work.  In  glaring 
contrast  to  the  factories  in  China,  Japan,  and  the  backward 


RUSSIAN  INDUSTRY 


35 


states  in  America,  the  writer  saw  no  child  workers  in  any 
factory  in  Russia. 

An  elaborate  plan  of  Social  Insurance  is  provided  by 
levying  from  12  to  28  per  cent  of  the  wage  bill  upon  all 
industries,  state  or  private.  This  covers  the  cost  of  sick¬ 
ness,  accidents,  incapacity  for  work,  forced  unemployment, 
confinement  for  women,  old  age  and  burial.  “The  Russian 
proletariat  has  taken  as  its  motto  the  complete  social  insur¬ 
ance  of  salaried  workers  as  well  as  the  poor  in  the  towns 
and  villages.”  Until  industry  becomes  more  profitable, 
however,  and  more  successful  in  production,  funds  are  in¬ 
adequate  for  the  fulfillment  of  more  than  a  part  of  this 
program. 


EDUCATION  AND  RELIGION  IN  RUSSIA 


Russia  has  not  only  a  new  economic  policy  but  a  new 
educational  and  a  new  religious  policy.  Before  the  war 
education  in  Russia  had  been  very  backward.  Less  than 
20  per  cent  of  the  population  was  literate.  In  1912  there 
were  68,671  in  the  universities  and  colleges,  467,558  in 
secondary  schools,  6,697,385  in  elementary  schools  or  a 
total  of  only  8,263,999  pupils  in  125,723  institutions.  The 
students  in  higher  education  were  gathered  chiefly  in  nine 
great  university  centers.  Although  their  intellectual  stand¬ 
ards  were  high,  their  culture  was  often  borrowed  and 
artificial.  The  masses  were  left  in  profound  ignorance, 
while  the  students  were  under  suspicion  by  the  authorities 
for  their  liberal  or  revolutionary  ideas. 

When  the  Bolshevist  government  came  into  power  they 
adopted  a  new  policy  of  compulsory,  free,  elementary  educa¬ 
tion.  Under  the  brilliant  leadership  of  M.  Lunacharsky, 
Peoples  Commissar  for  Public  Instruction,  the  latest  educa¬ 
tional  methods  were  introduced  in  a  four  years’  system  of 
compulsory  primary  education.  One-sixth  of  the  best  pupils 
were  to  continue  their  studies  for  five  years  of  secondary 
education.  This  was  to  be  followed  by  the  university  course, 
where,  instead  of  the  former  emphasis  upon  cultural  studies, 
the  applied  sciences,  engineering,  and  political  and  social 
studies  of  the  Marxian  school  were  to  be  favored. 

In  order  to  train  a  new  leadership  for  government  and 
industry  to  take  the  place  of  the  old  bourgeoisie  a  short 
three  years’  course  in  the  “workers’  faculties’’  was  estab¬ 
lished.  The  brightest  workers  were  chosen  from  the  fac¬ 
tories,  25  per  cent  of  them  from  the  Communist  Party  and 
most  of  the  remainder  from  the  trade  unions  and  various 
government  bodies.  Lew  places  were  left  for  the  former 
class  of  privilege.  Bukharin,  a  leading  Communist  writer, 
thus  defends  their  policy  of  education :  “The  true  basis  and 
meaning  of  the  dictatorship  of  the  proletariat  must  be  a 
proletarian  monopoly  of  education.  This  may  appear  shock¬ 
ing,  but  the  monopoly  of  education  always  was  and  always 
is  the  most  important  privilege  of  every  ruling  class.  There 
is  nothing  else  on  which  a  ruling  class  can  base  its  power. 
The  monopoly  of  education  must  become  the  privilege  of 
the  proletariat  if  the  proletariat  is  to  win.” 

The  new  policy  of  education  largely  broke  down  because 

36 


EDUCATION  AND  RELIGION  IN  RUSSIA  37 


of  lack  of  funds.  Dr.  Nansen  reports  less  pupils  in  elemen¬ 
tary  schools  in  1923  than  under  the  Czar’s  regime.  During 
this  year  hardly  one-third  of  the  120,000  students  in  Russia 
were  receiving  government  rations,  and  some  had  no  other 
means  of  support.  The  Student  Relief  organization  has 
been  providing  daily  meals  for  some  30,000  students  at  a 
cost  of  about  $1.25  a  month  per  student.  Many  are  in 
great  need.  Several  Russian  professors  literally  starved 
to  death. 

Lunacharsky  reported  to  the  Tenth  Soviet  Congress  in 
December,  1922,  that  the  conditions  under  which  the  teachers 
lived  were  appalling  and  that  the  $18,000,000  spent  on 
education  was  onlv  about  one-tenth  what  the  schools  received 
before  the  war.  He  stated  that  while  builders  received 
76  per  cent  of  a  minimum  living  wage,  teachers  received 
only  12  per  cent.  On  October  7,  1923,  Lunacharsky  re¬ 
ported  that  there  are  less  schools  in  Russia  at  present 
than  there  were  in  1914.  He  states  the  number  of  schools 
and  pupils  in  the  various  years  as  follows : 


Y ear 

Schools 

Pupils 

1911 

50,000 

3,500,000 

1914 

64,000 

4,200,000 

1921 

70,000 

6,000,000 

1922 

58,000 

4,900,000 

1923  January 

53,000 

4,400,000 

Russia  was  converted  to  Christianity  in  988  A.  D.,  adopting 
the  Greek  form  of  worship,  and  with  it  the  imperial  tradition 
from  Byzantium,  the  second  Rome.  Moscow  in  time  became 
a  third  Rome.  The  first  Romanoff  Czar  was  the  son  of 
the  Patriarch  who  was  the  real  ruler  of  Russia.  Then 
Peter  the  Great  abolished  the  patriarchate  and  became,  with 
all  succeeding  Czars,  the  head  of  both  Church  and  State. 
The  Church  became  not  only  the  chief  support  of  the  auto¬ 
cratic  State  but  its  subservient  tool  and  most  reactionary 
weapon.  The  Czar’s  appointee,  the  Procurator  of  the  Holy 
Synod,  was  often  the  most  sinister  influence  in  political  life. 
The  village  priest  was  at  times  the  effective  policeman  of 
the  Czar,  and  the  confessional  was  often  an  agency  of 
espionage.  The  miracle-working  mummies  of  the  saints 
were  found  to  be  merely  dried  bones  or  bogus  figures  of 
wax  or  stuffed  with  cotton.  As  F.  A.  Mackenzie  says, 
“The  Church  was  rich,  powerful  and  corrupt  and  stood 


38  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 


everywhere  for  reaction.  The  life  in  many  monasteries 
was  a  scandal.”  It  was  such  a  Church  that  the  leaders  of 
the  Revolution  feared.  It  had  consistently  opposed  reform 
under  the  Czar  and  under  the  new  government.  Many 
of  the  priests  were  involved  in  counter-revolutionary  activity. 
As  Archbishop  Evdokim  admits,  “It  is  not  surprising  that 
the  government  is  suspicious  of  the  Church.  During  the 
civil  war  the  heads  of  the  Church  worked  in  open  sympathy 
with  the  enemies  of  the  republic.” 

Before  the  war  some  eighty  millions,  or  94  per  cent  of 
the  population,  belonged  to  the  Greek  Orthodox  Church, 
some  three  millions  were  Roman  Catholics,  and  1,225,000 
were  Protestants.  There  was  almost  no  preaching  save 
a  few  formal  carefully  censored  sermons. 

The  attitude  of  the  Communist  Party  to  the  Church  is 
shown  by  Bucharin  in  the  A.  B.  C.  of  Communism ;  “In 
practice  no  less  than  in  theory  Communism  is  incompatible 
with  religious  faith.”  He  says,  “We  have  a  struggle  with 
the  Church  as  a  special  organization  existing  for  religious 
propaganda,  materially  interested  in  the  maintenance  of 
popular  ignorance  and  religious  enslavement.”  .  .  .  “The 
campaign  against  the  backwardness  of  the  masses  in  the 
matter  of  religion  must  be  conducted  with  patience  and 
considerateness  as  well  as  with  energy  and  perseverance. 
The  credulous  crowd  is  extremely  sensitive  to  anything  that 
hurts  religious  feeling.  To  thrust  atheism  on  the  masses, 
to  interfere  forcibly  with  religious  practices,  and  to  make 
mock  of  the  objects  of  popular  reverence,  would  not  assist 
but  would  rather  hinder  the  campaign  against  religion.” 

Yet  in  spite  of  Bucharin’s  words  the  Young  Communist 
Party  by  parades  and  parodies,  by  cartoons  and  ridicule, 
has  done  all  in  its  power  to  make  a  mockery  of  religion. 
The  Constitution  declares  that,  “for  the  purpose  of  securing 
to  the  workers  real  freedom  of  conscience  the  Church  is 
to  separate  from  the  State,  and  the  school  from  the  Church. 
Religious  and  anti-religious  propaganda  is  guaranteed  to 
every  citizen.”  However,  “anti-religious  propagandists  must 
not  interfere  with  or  incite  the  public  against  the  religious 
propagandists,  and  vice  versa.”  Before  the  war  those  who 
were  not  in  the  State  Church  could  be  expelled  from  gov¬ 
ernment  service,  but  now,  “any  legal  disabilities  connected 
with  the  profession  of  any  religion,  or  none,  are  abolished.” 

Prior  to  1914  there  were  40,000  Church  schools  with  some 
1,500,000  pupils,  but  now,  according  to  the  Decree  of  the 


EDUCATION  AND  RELIGION  IN  RUSSIA  39 


Council  of  the  People’s  Commissars,  “The  schools  are 
separate  from  the  Church.  The  teaching  of  religious  doc¬ 
trine  in  all  state  and  public,  as  well  as  in  private  educational 
institutions  in  which  general  subjects  are  taught  is  forbidden. 
Citizens  may  teach  and  study  religion  privately.” 

Education  of  the  youth  of  Russia  is  solely  a  state  function. 
Religion  is  not  supposed  to  be  taught  to  persons  below  the 
age  of  18  years.  In  the  home,  from  the  pulpits  of  churches 
and  in  Protestant  Sunday  schools,  however,  such  instruction 
is  given.  But  the  Church  is  forbidden  to  engage  in  educa¬ 
tional  and  charitable  activities  and  is  thus  shorn  of  much 
of  its  cultural  and  social  influence.  The  Criminal  Code  de¬ 
clares  that :  “Imparting  religious  instruction  in  State  or 
private  educational  institutions  to  children  or  minors  (under 
18  years)  is  punished  by  forced  labor  up  to  one  year”  (Arti¬ 
cle  121,  Chapter  III,  Moscow,  1923). 

Immediately  after  the  revolution  a  council  was  summoned 
to  deal  with  the  abuses  of  the  Church.  The  council  re¬ 
established  the  patriarchate  and  elected  Archbishop  Tikhon 
to  that  office.  After  his  arrest  another  council  was  called 
in  1922  when  many  conservative  or  reactionary  Church 
officials  had  been  placed  under  arrest  or  sent  to  distant 
parts  by  the  Soviet  government. 

This  council,  in  which  the  members  of  the  “Living  Church” 
were  the  determining  factor,  abolished  the  patriarchate,  and 
decided  upon  a  policy  of  reform.  The  revolution  was  ac¬ 
cepted  as  an  accomplished  fact  and  the  existing  government 
was  recognized.  The  separation  of  Church  and  State  was 
approved.  The  restrictions  of  celibacy  were  removed  from 
the  higher  clergy.  The  worship  of  relics  was  denounced 
as  superstition.  The  liturgy  was  revised,  and  it  was  decided 
to  replace  the  old  dead  language  of  Slavonic  by  the  living 
Russian  tongue  in  the  Church  services.  Plans  were  adopted 
for  the  education  of  the  clergy,  the  restoration  of  the  preach¬ 
ing  function  of  the  ministry,  and  for  the  application  of 
religion  in  a  program  of  social  justice  for  the  working 
masses.  The  social  aims  of  the  people’s  revolution  were 
endorsed  but  not  the  anti-religious  policy  of  the  Com¬ 
munist  Party. 

As  the  Reformed  Church  of  Russia,  endeavoring  to  unite 
all  progressive  elements  under  the  leadership  of  Archbishop 
Evdokim,  the  Metropolitan  of  Moscow,  Vedensky,  Kras- 
nitsky  and  M.  Lvov,  they  are  seeking  a  genuine  Reforma¬ 
tion  which  the  Church  sorely  needs  as  in  the  days  of  Luther. 


40  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 


The  more  conservative  portion  of  the  Church  under  Tikhon 
is  also  seeking  reform  somewhat  more  slowly.  The  govern¬ 
ment  will  doubtless  use  one  against  the  other  in  their  effort 
to  divide  and  weaken  the  religious  forces. 

The  writer  saw  the  Church  of  St.  Pieman  which  had  been 
confiscated  and  handed  over  to  the  Young  Communist  Party 
because  the  janitor  had  been  making  some  home  brew  vodka 
in  the  belfry.  In  place  of  the  altar  stood  the  bust  of  Karl 
Marx.  Above  were  the  portraits  of  Lenine  and  Trotsky. 
The  sacred  pictures  were  whitewashed  over  and  replaced 
by  cartoons.  One  showed  God  as  an  old  man  with  the 
Virgin  Mary  and  a  new  born  child.  Beneath  was  the  com¬ 
ment,  “For  1922  years  the  Virgin  Mary  gave  birth  to  Christ. 
In  1923  the  Young  Communist  Party  was  born.”  Worse 
cartoons  are  exhibited  in  the  magazine  “The  Atheist”  and 
elsewhere. 

When  we  spoke  of  our  feeling  at  such  a  coarse  exhibition 
of  vulgarity  a  leading  Communist  said  regarding  their  at¬ 
titude  to  religion,  “Old  Church,  or  Living  Church,  or  any 
fortune-telling  gypsy  on  the  street,  they  are  all  the  same 
to  us,  and  we  mean  by  all  the  means  in  our  power,  yet  with¬ 
out  the  persecution  to  which  we  ourselves  were  subjected, 
to  root  out  what  you  regard  as  religion  and  what  we  regard 
as  sheer  superstition.” 

Doubtless  the  government  believed  it  had  evidence  of 
counter-revolutionary  activity  of  many  of  the  bishops  and 
priests  who  were  shot,  including  the  Roman  Catholic  Father 
Butchkawitch  and  the  beloved  Archbishop  Benjamin,  Metro¬ 
politan  of  Petrograd.  But  these  anti-religious  activities  of 
the  Communists  have  done  more  to  outrage  and  estrange 
public  opinion  and  defer  the  recognition  of  the  government 
than  any  other  thing.  Being  stern  realists  themselves  and 
accustomed  to  look  with  contempt  upon  the  whole  sordid 
world  of  “capitalism,”  which  in  their  view  cares  for  nothing 
but  profit,  they  have  greatly  underrated  these  imponderable 
moral  forces  which  count  for  so  much  with  other  nations. 

We  repeat  our  earnest  hope  that  just  as  the  present  gov¬ 
ernment  had  the  good  sense  to  adopt  a  new  economic  policy, 
that  so  they  may  also  have  the  wisdom  to  devise  a  new 
religious  policy  which  will  place  them  more  in  line  with 
the  sensibilities  of  the  civilized  world. 


THE  FINAL  CHALLENGE 


Vividly  the  writer  recalls  a  scene  recently  witnessed  in 
Moscow.  Just  at  the  entrance  to  the  Kremlin,  which  is  the 
heart  of  Russia,  the  home  of  the  Czars,  the  historic  citadel 
of  church  and  state,  there  stands  the  most  sacred  shrine  in  all 
the  Russias,  that  of  the  Iberian  Virgin.  Worshippers  from 
all  parts  of  the  land,  simple  peasants  and  devout  women, 
night  and  day  stand  praying  at  this  shrine,  seeking  its  tra¬ 
ditional  blessings  of  healing.  Just  beside  it,  on  the  wall 
facing  this  chapel,  the  revolutionists  placed  without  comment 
the  familiar  inscription  from  Karl  Marx,  “Religion  the  opium 
of  the  people.” 

This  shrine  and  this  inscription  represent  the  two  forces 
that  are  today  contending  for  Russia  and  the  world — God 
and  mammon,  the  spiritual  and  the  carnal,  vital  religion 
and  materialistic  atheism,  Love  and  Hate. 

Let  us  make  no  mistake  about  the  forces  behind  these 
two.  Both  are  powerful.  Behind  that  inscription  stands 
the  frank  determination  of  the  most  enduring  party  govern¬ 
ment  in  Europe  today  to  root  out,  by  all  known  means  without 
force,  that  religion  which  they  regard  as  pure  superstition. 
Behind  it  are  vast  masses  of  labor  in  many  lands,  growingly 
class-conscious,  disillusioned — socialist,  communist,  syndi¬ 
calist,  anarchist,  revolutionary  or  reformist — but  prevail¬ 
ingly  apathetic  or  antagonistic  to  religion. 

Behind  that  shrine,  that  ikon  and  image,  are — what  ? 
The  organized  churches  of  the  world,  Greek,  Roman  and 
Protestant.  Are  they  prepared  for  this  struggle?  Are  they 
fit  to  survive  just  as  they  are?  Observe  the  superstition 
of  many  of  these  worshippers  at  this  typical  shrine,  as  they 
pay  for  their  prayers,  rely  upon  these  holy  relics,  bow  and 
cross  themselves  with  touching  devotion.  The  Greek 
Orthodox  Church  desperately  needs  a  thorough  reformation. 

Have  we  all  faced  this  challenge  of  Religion  as  the 
“opium  of  the  people”?  Is  there  any  measure  of  truth  in 
the  assertion?  Jesus’  way  of  life  was  revolutionary,  thor¬ 
oughgoing,  transforming.  It  meant  crucifixion,  resurrection, 
a  new  socialized  and  spiritualized  community  that  had  all 
things  common,  not  in  the  prosaic  literalism  of  legal  com¬ 
pulsion,  but  in  the  communal  life  dominated  by  the  one 
master  passion  of  love.  They  actually  did  share  the  life 
of  God  and  man,  of  rich  and  poor,  “from  each  according 
to  his  ability,  to  each  according  to  his  need.” 

41 


42  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 

But  have  not  our  later  adaptations  and  compromises  of 
religion  often  proved  an  orthodox  opiate  and  sedative,  mak¬ 
ing  us  content  to  worship  at  the  shrine  of  the  known  god  of 
things-as-they-are,  not  a  revolutionary  challenge  to  seek  the 
new  social  order  of  things-as-they-ought-to-be  ?  For  illus¬ 
tration,  when  the  writer  was  in  Japan,  he  found  a  common 
practice  of  the  managers  of  certain  factories  of  calling  in 
the  ministers  of  religion,  usually  Buddhist  but  sometimes 
Christian,  to  talk  to  the  workers  and  keep  them  contented, 
in  order  to  increase  production. 

In  one  city  the  keeper  of  a  brothel  asked  an  earnest 
missionary  to  talk  to  the  inmates.  The  missionary  accepted 
the  invitation  just  as  he  would  have  done  to  any  prison  or 
other  institution  of  need.  The  keeper  was  profuse  in  his 
gratitude  after  the  address,  providing  tea  and  cake.  “But 
why,”  asked  the  missionary,  “do  you  wish  me  to  help  these 
poor  creatures  while  you  treat  them  as  you  do?”  “Oh,” 
said  the  brothel  keeper,  “they  are  getting  ‘dangerous  thoughts’ 
these  days,  they  are  no  longer  contented  with  their  lot.”  He 
was  quite  willing  for  a  personal  application  of  religion  for  a 
future  life,  provided  there  was  no  social  application  to  com 
ditions  in  this;  quite  willing  to  have  their  souls  saved  pro¬ 
vided  their  bodies  were  not.  This  man  conceived  of  religion 
as  an  opiate  of  contentment  for  the  status  quo,  not  a  revo¬ 
lutionary  challenge  to  change  conditions.  The  illustration 
was  an  extreme  case  but  typical  of  a  common  misconception 
of  religion. 

After  the  American  colonies  had  been  driven  to  revolu¬ 
tion,  King  George  III  issued  a  proclamation  calling  a  fast 
throughout  the  churches  of  England  to  atone  for  the  sins 
of  the  rebellious  colonists.  On  this  occasion  scores  of  ser¬ 
mons  were  preached  by  eminent  clergymen  upholding  the 
divine  right  of  kings,  and  upbraiding  the  revolutionists  for 
their  disloyalty  and  ingratitude.  To  them  religion  was  a 
respectable  convention,  a  comfortable  s.edative,  a  quieting 
opiate  to  subdue  revolutionary  discontent  and  uphold  the 
vested  interests  of  Church  and  State. 

In  1793,  Paley  showed  to  his  own  satisfaction  that  there 
was  scarcely  any  respect  in  which  the  poor  were  not  more 
fortunate  than  the  rich.  “Some  of  the  necessities  which 
poverty  imposes  are  not  hardships  but  pleasures.  Frugality 
itself  is  a  pleasure.  It  is  an  exercise  of  attention  and  con¬ 
trivance,  which,  whenever  it  is  successful,  produces  satisfac¬ 
tion.  The  very  care  and  forecast  that  are  necessary  to  keep 


THE  FINAL  CHALLENGE 


43 


expenses  and  earning  upon  a  level,  form,  when  not  em¬ 
barrassed  by  too  great  difficulties,  an  agreeable  engagement 
of  the  thoughts.  This  is  lost  amidst  abundance.  A  yet  more 
serious  advantage  which  persons  in  inferior  stations  possess, 
is  the  ease  with  which  they  provide  for  their  children.  All 
the  provision  which  a  poor  man’s  child  requires  is  contained 
in  two  words,  ‘industry  and  innocence.’  With  these  qualities, 
though  without  a  shilling  to  set  him  forwards,  he  goes  into 
the  world  prepared  to  become  a  useful,  virtuous  and  happy 
man.” 

“Happy  man !”  ah,  thrice  happy  if  he  has  partaken  plenti¬ 
fully  enough  of  this  opium  of  the  people,  of  a  personal, 
possessive  and  exclusive  religion  which  preaches  Content¬ 
ment  to  others,  while  it  refuses  to  share  its  own  well- 
hoarded  store. 

When  slavery  was  a  part  of  the  established  order,  for 
centuries  it  received  the  hearty  support  of  most  of  the 
churches.  For  example,  in  1853  a  typical  volume  was 
printed  entitled  “Plain  Sermons  for  Servants,”  to  keep  the 
slaves  contented,  with  an  introduction  by  Bishop  Meade. 
The  following  is  typical  of  the  teaching  of  the  day:  “You 
should  remember  that  God  has  placed  you  where  you  are. 
God  knows  better  than  you  do  whether  it  is  best  for  you  to 
be  rich  or  poor,  high  or  low,  in  bondage  or  in  liberty.  Had 
He  left  you  to  choose  your  state  in  life  for  yourself,  you 
might  have  made  a  choice  that  would  ruin  you  forever ! 
The  last  typical  sermon  in  this  volume  is  entitled,  “The 
Faithful  Christian  Shall  Wear  a  Crown.”  The  opiate  is, 
contentment  in  slavery  here — a  crown  hereafter ! 

These  men  were  not  conscious  hypocrites.  They  were 
the  typical  religious  leaders  of  their  day.  They  were  simply 
blinded  by  tradition  and  self-interest.  Are  the  people  of  this 
generation  subject  to  similar  temptations?  Are  there  equally 
earnest  and  sincere  men  today  among  employers  and  leaders 
of  thought  who  all  unconsciously  are  using  their  privilege 
and  power  to  .support  “things-as-they-are”  and  to  brand  as 
revolutionary  every  effort  to  make  “things-as-they-ought-to- 
be”  ?  Are  they  giving  the  workers  reason  to  regard  religion 
as  the  opium  of  the  people,  rather  than  what  it  was  to 
Jesus,  a  constructive  revolutionary  force  for  the  building 
of  a  new  world? 

The  consistent  Christian  and  the  Russian  Communist  agree 
in  this,  that  “no  man  can  serve  two  masters” ;  he  cannot  be 
true  both  to  God  and  mammon.  He  must  choose  between  a 


44  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 


material  and  "a  spiritual  interpretation  of  life.  Is  the  thor¬ 
oughgoing  materialistic  interpretation  of  history  by  economic 
determinism,  or  the  spiritual  interpretation  of  life  valid? 
There  seems  to  be  no  escape  from  this  final  alternative. 

Nineteen  centuries  ago  a  Galilean  carpenter  in  an  obscure 
province  of  the  Roman  Empire  of  blood  and  iron  and  gold 
hurled  into  a  warring  world  a  message  of  Good  News.  He 
proclaimed  a  new  social  order  which  he  called  the  Kingdom 
of  God  on  earth.  With  bold,  concrete,  practical  idealism 
he  interpreted  life  as  ultimately  personal  and  spiritual.  He 
did  not  believe  in  an  unexplained  and  sordid  world  merely 
of  matter  and  force,  nor  in  a  brute  struggle  for  existence, 
resulting  in  the  survival  of  the  fittest  to  fight.  He  did  not 
advocate  a  class  war  motivated  by  hate,  the  dictatorship  of 
one  class,  however  large  or  needy,  based  upon  the  compulsion 
of  armed  force  and  a  terror,  red  or  white.  He  was  not  con¬ 
cerned  with  economic  “surplus  values”  but  with  human 
values. 

For  him  all  life  derives  its  meaning  and  power  from  its 
source,  and  that  source  is  not  matter  but  spirit,  not  hate 
but  love,  not  man  but  God.  In  him  we  live  and  move  and 
have  our  being,  so  that  all  life  is  of  infinite  worth,  with 
eternal  possibilities. 

Life  to  him  was  not  a  sordid  scramble  for  wealth  and 
power.  It  was  not  a  rushing  distraction,  a  fiercely  com¬ 
peting  conflict  of  hate.  It  gained  repose  because  immov¬ 
ably  centered  in  a  single  principle — love.  Love  meant  the 
full  sharing  of  life,  in  limitless  self-giving  and  self-sacrifice, 
for  the  building  of  a  new  social  order  which  was  at  once 
“the  commonweal  of  God”  and  a  brotherhood  of  co-operant 
goodwill.  And  this  new  humanity,  this  practical  ideal  of  a 
social  order  which  was  at  the  same  time  a  Kingdom  of  God 
and  a  democracy  of  free  men,  was  gloriously  possible.  It 
was  worth  living  and  dying  for. 

And  straightway  his  followers  went  forth  to  conquer  a 
world.  Where  they  followed  his  way  of  life  they  achieved 
his  victory.  But  many  forgot  his  way  and  took  their  own. 
The  little  indomitable  band  of  militant  love  became  in  time 
a  vast  and  vested  hierarchy  of  wealth  and  worldly  power. 
Popes,  priests,  monks,  kings  and  politicians  wore  his 
emblem  of  sacrifice  and  shame  as  a  graceful  ornament. 
They  built  him  cathedrals  of  costly  stone  and  stained  glass 
instead  of  a  social  structure  of  a  redeemed  humanity.  They 
gave  their  alms  and  “charity,”  but  not  justice  and  mercy, 


THE  FINAL  CHALLENGE 


45 


to  the  least  of  these  his  brethren.  They  made  ikons  and 
images,  hard  and  fast  ecumenical  creeds  and  Protestant 
dogmas,  they  offered  him  faith  and  works,  the  gifts  of  their 
superfluous  wealth,  the  profession  of  faultless  orthodoxy,  or 
even  at  times  the  zealous  persecution  of  heretics  and  free 
thinkers  when  permitted  by  the  secular  state.  They  fought 
his  battles  with  the  sword,  they  worshipped  him ;  they  gave 
their  bodies  to  be  burned  in  his  cause.  But  the  one  thing 
needful  they  often  forgot — Love,  the  full  sharing  of  life 
here  and  now  with  their  fellow  men. 

Gradually  the  laboring  masses,  the  weary  and  heavy  laden 
to  whom  the  Galilean  Jesus  had  preached,  drew  apart.  They 
became  “this  multitude  that  knoweth  not  the  law  that  is 
accursed”  ;  fiercely  blamed  for  their  irreligion,  their  atheism, 
their  Bolshevism — a  great  mass  often  Marxian  and  material¬ 
istic  and  finally  hardened  and  embittered.  God  knows  the 
writer  would  not  make  light  of  true  religion,  in  which  he 
passionately  believes,  and  of  which  there  is  much  in  the 
world  today.  He  believes  in  vital  personal  religion  not  only, 
but  in  necessary  organization  in  all  departments  of  life,  in¬ 
cluding  the  Church  as  the  organic,  social  expression  of 
religion.1 

But  the  masses  could  not  seem  to  believe  in  a  future 
heaven  promised  by  a  prosperous  class  which  did  not  prac¬ 
tice  their  professed  creed  here  on  earth.  So  they  tried  to 
form  a  gospel  of  their  own.  They,  too,  sought  to  build  a 
new  social  order  of  brotherhood.  They  incorporated  in 
their  programmes  and  constitutions  many  of  the  principles 
of  the  spiritual  social  order,  but  they  built  it  on  force  rather 
than  on  freedom,  on  a  class  rather  than  on  an  all-inclusive 
brotherhood,  and  mindful  of  their  lot  and  the  treatment 
they  had  received,  sometimes  on  hatred  rather  than  on  love. 
But  it  was  a  gospel  of  a  sort,  for  it  was  tangible,  concrete, 
immediate,  challenging;  something  here  and  now  for  this 
earth,  for  which  they  were  willing  to  die,  as  they  would 
have  done  for  the  spiritual  gospel  had  they  seen  it  lived 
and  practiced  in  the  spirit  of  Jesus. 

Here  was  a  body  of  labor  lacking  only  a  spiritual  soul; 
and  there  was  the  Church  with  a  soul  but  no  body  of  social 
expression.  They  represented  two  incomplete  and  comple¬ 
mentary  fragments  of  one  common  humanity,  and  they 
needed  each  other.  The  Church  needed  to  be  socialized; 

labor  needed  to  be  spiritualized. 

»  1  • 

1  His  position  in  this  matter  is  stated  in  “Facing  the  Crisis,”  pp.  203-231. 


46  RUSSIA:  A  WARNING  AND  A  CHALLENGE 

Labor  has  issued  the  call,  “Workers  of  the  world,  unite!  ’ 
Yes,  they  will,  they  must  unite;  they  already  are  uniting. 
But  for  what?  For  a  class  war,  a  dictatorship,  a  terror,  a 
revolution  ?  Most  certainly  if  we  drive  them  to  it  and  if 
there  is  nothing  left  for  them  but  that. 

But  there  is  one  way  left.  Why  not  try  Jesus’  way  of 
life?  Whv  not  share  our  whole  life  in  “creation’s  final 

J 

law” — the  law  of  Love? 

One  and  all  we  stand  today  before  this  final  challenge, 
this  ultimate  choice.  Are  we  to  follow  God  or  mammon? 
The  choice  is  not  a  matter  of  course,  a  mere  matter  of 
profession  or  creed,  or  lip  service,  to  a  Master  whose  way 
of  life  we  crucify  and  reject.  “Mammon”  is  not  a  poetical 
scriptural  allusion,  it  means  money,  our  money,  a  selfish  way 
of  living,  a  materialistic  interpretation  of  life.  It  may  be 
the  frankly  confessed  way  of  the  Marxian  Communist,  the 
secretly  veiled  way  of  the  militarist,  the  respectable  and 
prosperous  way  of  the  selfish  capitalist,  the  equally  selfish 
way  of  the  labor  leader  who  is  out  for  his  own  gain  rather 
than  the  cause  of  his  comrades,  or  it  may  be  the  consciously 
or  unconsciously  hypocritical  way  of  the  religionist  who  pro¬ 
fesses  Jesus’  way  of  life  while  he  denies  it  in  practice  and 
makes  religion  “a  spitting  and  a  byword”  to  the  masses  now 
in  open  rebellion. 

It  is  thus  that  Russia  constitutes  a  warning  and  a  challenge 
to  us  all.  Each  must  make  the  choice  between  a  materialistic 
and  a  spiritual  interpretation  of  life.  One  and  all,  let  us 
work  together,  not  for  our  class,  small  or  large,  privileged 
or  unprivileged,  propertied  or  proletarian,  but  for  the  com¬ 
mon  undivided  humanity  of  one  world  of  brother  men. 


LIGHT  UPON  ECONOMIC  AND  INTERNATIONAL 

PROBLEMS 

1.  THE  NEW  WORLD  of  LABOR,  by  Sherwood  Eddy.  The  result  of  investigation 
in  ten  principal  industrial  countries  during  a  fourteen  months’  tour  in  Europe  and 
Asia.  Considers  labor  conditions  and  problems  in  China,  Japan,  India,  Russia, 
the  continent  of  Europe  and  America.  220  pages,  cloth  $1.50. 

2.  facing  the  crisis,  by  Sherwood  Eddy.  The  Fondren  Lectures  of  1922. 
An  outgrowth  of  25  years  of  study,  observation  and  addresses  before  students 
in  all  parts  of  the  United  States,  Europe,  the  Near  East  and  the  Orient.  A 
challenging  discussion  of  the  vital  problems  of  the  hour — philosophical,  religious, 
social  and  industrial.  241  pages,  cloth-lined  paper  50  cents,  cloth  $1.50. 

Group  Discussion  on  Facing  the  Crisis  for  class  study  prepared  by  A.  J.  Gregg, 
44  pages,  10  cents  net. 

3.  the  prevention  of  war,  by  Philip  Kerr  and  Lionel  Curtis.  An  exceedingly 
valuable  treatment  of  the  subject.  170  pages,  cloth  $2.50. 

4.  Christ  or  mars,  by  Will  Irwin.  An  extraordinarily  vivid  picture  of  modern 
war  and  a  vigorous  challenge  to  the  churches  by  the  author  of  “The  Next  War.” 
187  pages,  cloth  $1.50. 

5.  Christianity  and  economic  problems,  a  Discussion-Group  Text  Book, 
prepared  for  the  Federal  Council  of  Churches.  Kirby  Page,  Editor.  Facts, 
Principles,  Programs.  An  invaluable  reference  book.  120  pages,  cloth  50  cents. 

6.  the  church  and  industrial  reconstruction,  by  the  Committee  on  the 
War  and  the  Religious  Outlook.  A  notable  book,  with  chapters  on  the  Christian 
Ideal  for  Society.  Unchristian  Aspects  of  the  Present  Industrial  Order. 
Present  Practicable  Steps  Toward  a  More  Christian  Industrial  Order,  etc. 
296  pages,  paper  $1.00,  cloth  $2.00. 

7.  Christianity  and  social  science,  by  Chas.  A.  Ellwood.  A  stimulating 
discussion  of  the  respective  contributions  of  science  and  religion  in  building  a 
new  social  order.  220  pages,  cloth  $1.75. 

8.  the  constructive  revolution  of  jesus,  by  Samuel  Dickey.  A  study  of 
some  of  the  social  attitudes  of  Jesus.  160  pages,  cloth  $1.50. 

9.  an  introduction  to  the  study  of  labor  problems,  by  Professor  Gordon 
S.  Watkins.  This  is  probably  the  most  useful  book  of  its  kind  available.  Up-to- 
date  information  on  a  wide  range  of  subjects.  664  pages,  cloth  $3.00. 

10.  principles  of  the  new  economics,  by  Professor  Lionel  E.  Edie.  An 
exceedingly  valuable  presentation  of  the  point  of  view  held  by  the  new  school  of 
economists.  An  abundance  of  reference  material.  525  pages,  cloth  $2.75. 

11.  the  decay  of  capitalist  civilization,  by  Sidney  and  Beatrice  Webb.  A 
challenging  discussion  of  the  weaknesses  of  the  present  social  order.  242  pages, 
cloth  $1.75. 

12.  the  acquisitive  society,  by  R.  H.  Tawney,  Fellow  of  Balliol  College, 
Oxford.  A  vigorous  discussion  of  rights  and  functions,  industry  as  a  profession, 
property  and  creative  work,  the  condition  of  efficiency,  etc.  188  pages,  cloth 
$1.50. 

13.  the  malady  of  Europe,  by  M.  E.  Ravage.  A  discussion  of  the  weakness 
of  contemporary  European  civilization.  Cloth  $2.00. 

14.  league  or  war,  by  Irving  Fisher.  The  most  complete  account  of  the 
League  of  Nations.  268  pages,  cloth  $2.00. 

15.  an  introduction  to  world  politics,  by  Herbert  Adams  Gibbons.  An 
invaluable  outline  of  world  problems.  595  pages,  cloth  $4.00. 

16.  the  decadence  of  Europe,  by  Francesco  Nitti.  A  discussion  of  the 
effects  of  the  Treaty  of  Versailles  upon  Europe.  302  pages,  cloth  $3.00. 

17.  turkey,  the  great  powers  and  the  bagdad  railway,  by  Edward  Mead 
Earle.  A  study  in  imperialism.  363  pages,  cloth  $2.25. 

18.  cross  currents  in  Europe  today,  by  Chas.  A.  Beard.  Summarizes  the 
diplomatic  revelations  since  the  war  and  discusses  present  conditions  in  Europe. 
278  pages,  cloth  $2.50. 

Any  of  these  books  may  be  ordered  from 
ASSOCIATION  PRESS 


347  Madison  Avenue 


New  York 


PAMPHLETS  ON  CURRENT  PROBLEMS 


CHRISTIANITY  AND  WORLD  PROBLEMS  SERIES 

George  H.  Doran  Company,  Publishers 
244  Madison  Avenue,  New  York 

No.  1.  war:  its  causes,  consequences  and  cure,  by  Kirby  Page,  96  pages, 
15  cents  each. 

No.  2.  Russia:  a  warning  and  a  challenge,  by  Sherwood  Eddy,  48  pages, 
10  cents  net. 

No.  3.  France  and  the  peace  of  Europe,  by  Kirby  Page,  32  pages,  10 
cents  net. 

Additional  numbers  in  this  series  will  be  announced  shortly,  on  “World  Prob¬ 
lems  of  Today,”  “The  Near  East,”  “Latin  America,”  etc. 

CHRISTIANITY  AND  INDUSTRY  SERIES 

No.  1.  industrial  facts,  by  Kirby  Page.  Concrete  data  concerning  indus¬ 
trial  problems  and  proposed  solutions.  32  pages,  10  cents  net. 

No.  2.  collective  bargaining,  by  Kirby  Page.  An  ethical  evaluation  of 
some  phases  of  trade  unionism  and  the  open-shop  movement.  32  pages,  10  cents 
net. 

No.  3.  fellowship,  by  Basil  Mathews  and  Harry  Bisseker.  Preface  by 
Sherwood  Eddy.  A  consideration  of  fellowship  as  a  means  of  building  the 
Christian  social  order.  32  pages,  10  cents  net. 

No.  4.  the  sword  or  the  cross,  by  Kirby  Page.  A  consideration  of  the 
ethics  of  war  between  nations  and  between  classes;  an  analysis  of  Jesus’  way  of 
life.  64  pages,  15  cents  net.  (Regular  Edition,  $1.20.) 

No.  6.  America:  its  problems  and  perils,  by  Sherwood  Eddy.  An  analysis 
of  outstanding  social,  industrial,  and  race  problems.  32  pages,  10  cents  net. 

No.  7.  incentives  in  modern  life,  by  Kirby  Page.  Are  the  motives  of 
Jesus  practicable  in  modern  business  and  professional  life?  32  pages,  10  cents 
net. 

No.  8.  industrial  unrest:  a  way  out,  by  B.  Seebohm  Rowntree.  Practical 
suggestions  by  an  employer  of  7,000  workers.  32  pages,  10  cents  net. 

No.  9.  the  economic  order:  what  is  it?  what  is  it  worth?  by  Professor 
John  H.  Gray.  56  pages,  10  cents  net. 

No.  10.  WHY  NOT  TRY  Christianity?  by  Samuel  Zane  Batten.  64  pages, 
15  cents  net. 

FEDERAL  COUNCIL  OF  CHURCHES  SERIES 

No.  1.  the  wage  question,  10  cents. 

No.  2.  the  coal  controversy,  10  cents. 

international  problems  and  the  Christian  way  of  life — A  syllabus  of 
questions  for  use  in  Forums  and  Discussion  Classes,  prepared  by  the  Commis¬ 
sion  on  International  Relations  of  the  National  Conference  on  the  Christian  Way 
of  Life.  100  pages,  30  cents. 

toward  THE  understanding  of  jesus,  by  Professor  V.  G.  Simkhovitch.  A 
cheap  edition  of  this  notable  essay.  83  pages,  25  cents. 

Any  of  these  pamphlets  may  be  ordered  from 

THE  PAMPHLET  DEPARTMENT 
311  Division  Avenue  Hasbrouck  Heights,  N.  J. 


